


what goes around, sometimes comes around (boomerang)

by k506rl



Category: Wanna One (Band)
Genre: (but i promise that none of these horrible things are fetishized or anything of the sort), Abuse, Action/Adventure, Angst, Assassins & Hitmen, Chronic Illness, Drama, Hacking, M/M, Mystery, Organized Crime, Other, Past Rape/Non-con, Prostitution, Stalking, Torture, You Have Been Warned, also i promise that it's not all horrible and sad despite the tags lol, don't read the tags unless you want spoilers, multiple POVs, snuff/torture films
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-03-21
Updated: 2018-05-16
Packaged: 2019-04-05 17:07:22
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 12
Words: 28,575
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14048877
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/k506rl/pseuds/k506rl
Summary: Jihoon wants nothing but revenge on those who hurt his family. A new relationship forms between an assassin and a prostitute. A Doctor is trying to find the cure to a rare illness. The rich-boy Daehwi seems to have a new disturbing admirer. These stories all come together in a game of revenge, life and death.





	1. Park Jihoon I

**Author's Note:**

> PLEASE, PLEASE read the tags if there is anything you are easily triggered by. note: i won't romanticize any of the topics tagged, but there will still be detailed mentions of them, so proceed at your own risk, please.
> 
> haven't posted on AO3 for a while, but i've been getting back into storytelling and was inspired by Wanna One's new MV. hopefully someone will enjoy this story. it's going to be 13 chapters long!

The small boy sat at the edge of the playground of the local park, staring at the grassy ground. The other boys and girls were playing on the swings and climbing frames, but he barely paid any attention to even the idea of playing. All he could think about was what it was that caused him to be who he was today - an orphan. Who was responsible for ruining his life, for stripping away his happy family and throwing him away to rot? Despite being only eight years old, he had already made up his mind that the thing he wished for most in this world was for those people to suffer.

"Hey, Jihoon." He suddenly heard a soft voice calling his name. Suddenly coming back to reality, he looked up to see a pair of smiling eyes, welcoming him. "Come play with us." Daniel suggested.

He had no idea why he did so, but at that moment, he pushed his plans of revenge to the back of his mind to join the first person that had spoken to him since his admission to the home.

-

Eight years later, Jihoon and Daniel were sitting in the same park on a cool, Autumn night, gliding casually on the swings.

"You know, this is the exact place where I decided I wanted to be your friend." Jihoon said. Looking to his side, Daniel had a confused expression on his face. "That time you asked me to play with you." He sighed, reminding the slightly more dense, but more muscular of the two of their first interaction.

A smirk of remembrance on his face, Daniel replied "Oh yeah. You looked like you were gonna cry. I felt sorry for you." He laughed. Jihoon showed fake offence at Daniel's words before also chuckling. A moment of silence followed.

"I wasn't going to cry. I was planning how I would hurt them." Jihoon now spoke with a more serious tone.

"Yeah, I kinda figured that out after all you could talk about for the first few months of our friendship was revenge."

"But you stuck around, despite what I was saying."

"I guess that... I admired your passion." Daniel's swinging suddenly coming to a halt as his shoes scraped against the gravel. "You loved your parents, you still do, and I guess I saw that, and realised that you wanting those people to die wasn't really so shocking." Jihoon also slowed down his swinging, joining the still night air with his closest friend.

"And what do you think about me still wanting it, even now?" Jihoon said, almost a whisper.

"Wanting what?” He asked dumbly.

“Wanting those people to suffer." Jihoon stared into the dark treeline ahead. He hadn't discussed this revenge with Daniel for a few years by this point, but that didn't mean he had forgotten his plans. In fact, Jihoon's plans were twice as detailed and three times as intricate as they had been those few years ago.

Daniel was silent for a few minutes, thinking with a frown on his face. "No matter what my logic says... I still understand." Daniel finally stated. "But," He turned to Jihoon, who in turn looked him in the eyes. "How would you be able to do it? You aren't strong or particularly quick, you've never done martial arts or fighting. Those people you hate... they are powerful and clever. Getting your revenge won't be easy, you know."

"I know." Jihoon replied without hesitation. "I know that I can't fight. And I know it also won't be easy - especially not on my own." He said, looking deep into Daniel's eyes, which grew slightly wider at the realisation of what Jihoon was suggesting.

-

One and a half years later, Jihoon was waiting in the treeline of the same park. He had been sitting there for hours, staring at his phone screen, waiting for something. He was shivering from the cold spring night, but couldn't care less. There were far more important matters to focus on right now, for example the fact that Jaehwan, who was supposed to be updating him on Daniel's every move, hadn't sent a message in over five minutes.

The air was crisp and Jihoon's cheeks and nose had turned bright red. Crouching behind a tree, out of view from any passers-by, Jihoon silently begged the gods, that he hadn't believed in since the night he was taken from his parents, for Daniel to be safe. He had convinced Daniel to go along with his plans - his evil, illegal and immoral plans. Part of him was even starting to regret it, even though he knew that Daniel was the only option he had to be able to carry out his plans. Daniel was still an important friend, his best friend, and a valuable resource.

And then, suddenly, a text came through from Jaehwan.

_'i'm taking the dog for a walk'_

Jihoon let out a sigh of relief.

 _'what took the dog so long to get ready?'_ Jihoon repied.

_'he got a bit excited'_

And with that, Jihoon bounced up and looked around, waiting for that tall, wide-shouldered figure to appear. And it was barely any time before exactly that happened. Daniel approached the shorter boy after walking through the woods to reach him, just like they had arranged. He was carrying a rucksack, wearing all black, and had a small splash of blood on his face.

"Did anyone see you?" Jihoon asked first, after assessing that Daniel was walking normally, therefore not seriously injured.

"No. Like Jaehwan said, nobody walks through the metro at night. No one saw me." He said, staring off into space a little.

"Are... you okay?" Jihoon said apprehensively, unsure about how his typically peaceful friend was feeling.

"I mean... I chopped a man's hand off." He said, eyes still a little glazed over. It was only now that Jihoon noticed how Daniel was shaking slightly; he wasn't sure if it was from the cold or from the fear of having just committed a crime. "But... It was the best I've felt in years." Daniel continued, and to Jihoon's surprise, let out a wide, yet nervous, smile. "Does that make me a monster?" He said, his voice also wavering slightly with nerves that were likely all over the place in that moment.

"No." Jihoon replied immediately, reaching up to wipe that speck of red from his best friend’s face. Despite being surprised at Daniel's confession of enjoyment, he also expected Daniel to question himself. "If anything, I'm the monster. I'm the one that wanted him hurt. I'm the one that asked you to do it. And you knew that. We both knew it from the start, and I still want this. I still want to carry on hurting those people." Jihoon said, just barely articulating his thoughts, but it seemed to help Daniel calm down anyway.

The two of them soon got to work finding a place to bury the hand that Daniel had stored in his bag. They dug a hole underneath a tree deep in the wooded area, where barely anyone ever went, especially not on a cold night like this.

"Funny story." Daniel broke the silence while they were digging. "I almost accidentally cut off his right hand." He smirked. Jihoon looked at him questioningly. "You know, you said you wanted to cut off his hand because he was the one that signed the papers to increase the prices of those medicines, right?" Jihoon nodded. "So I thought that cutting off the right hand would be the solution, but then I realised that when he tried to defend himself, you know, before I tied him up, he tried to stab me with his left hand. So, just the second before I started to chop off his right hand, I realised that the left hand would be better." He explained. They had now chucked both the bag and the weapon in question into the narrow but deep ditch they had made, and proceeded to fill the gap back in with dirt.

Jihoon smiled, both in relief that they had buried the hand without any issues, and the fact that his friend had bothered to even think of such a minor detail in a situation like that. He patted Daniel on the shoulder, and the two of them walked home to their shared apartment in the city.

-

The first revenge was that left hand. Of course, there was a full-fledged investigation afterwards, since it was an incredibly influential CEO whose hand Daniel had taken. But, with careful planning and three very determined men, they went unnoticed.

Then, Jaehwan made a breakthrough. The genius that he was, he made the suggestion to Jihoon of taking the money from those who had benefited from that deal the most. To increase the price of a drug from a barely-affordable price to almost one hundred times more, there were many that could easily be brought down this way. And Jaehwan, with encouragement from Jihoon, did not disappoint. It took him barely a few hours to hack through the banking systems and take enormous amounts of money out of the three people they had decided to ‘hurt’. Some of it they donated to various independent mental health charities, some so unrelated causes, and some they kept for themselves. This was not just for the need to support themselves, but also in order to fund their biggest plan yet; they planned to take down the doctors who had told Jihoon that his parents were a lost cause, and that they were no longer able to take care of him - the exact actions that were taken to take him from his ill parents and put him in a foster home; he wanted to do something just as bad to them.

They considered getting those doctors fired one way or another, but they all agreed that was not a harsh enough punishment. Instead, Jihoon knew that the only way to make them feel how he felt was to ruin their lives completely, not simply take away their jobs, only for them to be able to move on to something else.

First of all, there was Mrs. Ong, the middle-aged, slightly plump woman. Jihoon recalled her as the one who made the decision to take his parents away after having promised both Jihoon and his parents that her counselling would be effective in helping them to overcome their issues. In truth, her therapy only led to his parents' deterioration - they were convinced that their condition was purely psychological, but it just wasn't the case. When the woman realised that she had been supplying the wrong treatments for over two years, she blamed her mistake on the sanity of the two parents, causing them to be separated from their only child.

Second, there was the tall, thin and young man that Jihoon now knew to be named Hwang Minhyun. He was the guy who blindly followed the orders of Mrs. Ong. He re-enforced the lie that the drugs Jihoon's parents were no longer able to take were not the cause of their deterioration; and that it was the fault of 'pure cognitive dysfunction'. Had he not said such lies just in order to forward his career, Jihoon believed that something else could have been done to treat his parents.

Lastly, the doctor who Jihoon had seen the night he snuck out of the orphanage to go and visit his parents in the psychiatric hospital they had been living in since the separation. He found his mother's window on the ground floor, and watched her sleep for an hour or so. It was the first time he had seen either of his parents in weeks, and although he knew he would be punished for sneaking out, he only felt relief from seeing his mother sleeping so peacefully that night. However, that was all broken when this doctor walked into the room. As soon as he did, Jihoon's mother woke, most likely from the noise of the door. The doctor had locked the door behind him and, when Jihoon's mother had looked at him, confused, he slapped her right across the face.

In shock, Jihoon watched with wide eyes, his eight-year-old self not fully comprehending what was happening. He heard some vague shouting from his mother through the glass, but couldn't make out what she was saying. All he could see was his mother being pinned down onto her bed despite her attempts at escaping, and the man began to put his hand underneath his mother's clothes. Things became more violent, and Jihoon saw his mother's eyes start to glaze over, getting her mind away from this horrible situation. She let her head flop to the side to look out of the window, and she made eye contact with her son. That was when Jihoon felt his mother speak to him without moving her mouth. He knew that he shouldn't watch this scene unfold, and that he had to get away.

With these three, Jihoon's revenge would finally be complete. The main problem they had was: how would they bring them down? First of all, they had no idea who the man who had raped Jihoon's mother even was; there were no records of him in the hospital, as Jaehwan had thoroughly searched their provate databases. Secondly, bringing down a powerful woman like Mrs. Ong would require more than just intimidating or hurting her, and even something as small as that seemed to be near impossible with her high status. And lastly, Minhyun, despite being a simple doctor whom could easily be found, they did not yet know how they could hurt him effectively.

But no matter what, Jihoon was determined to get what he desired most.

 


	2. Kang Daniel I

Today’s task was simple: befriend this man, and try to get any information out of him that may be of use to bringing down Mrs. Ong. This man, Ong Seungwoo, was easy enough to find; as a model, and son of an influential scientist, he often attended gatherings and events. Word gets around when a guy with such a strange name as Ong starts appearing, especially when he earns a reputation as someone that everyone could be friends with.

And so, Daniel and Jihoon decided to go and scout out the parties that he was likely to attend. Jaehwan had found a list of attendees for a science convention, specifically for the giving of science awards. Both Mrs. Ong, who was on the nominee list for Best Psychological Breakthrough, and her son were on that list. Jaehwan added Jihoon and Daniel to the list, using the fake names Jimin and Daesung, and had conveniently given them seats on the same table as the man they were aiming for.

In truth, Daniel was expecting to be involved with more action. After the time he cut that man’s hand off, he had been waiting for Jihoon to send him on another violent mission. But, and to the taller man’s disappointment, that day never came. Yes, he did get some excitement from going undercover, pretending to be someone he wasn’t around powerful people and whatnot, but it wasn’t the same. He wanted to feel that adrenaline again, the adrenaline that got his blood pumping and heightened his senses. That feeling made him feel powerful, as if his actions could actually affect another person. Having grown up in an orphanage, with no particular intellectual or creative talents, he always felt that he could never make a difference in the world. But, when Jihoon had asked him so desperately to help him get justice, he started to feel needed. His strength and loyalty would finally prove useful to put something right that was wrong; no matter how fucked up the revenge was.

He kept reminding himself that he mustn’t go looking for trouble – doing so would likely only bring attention to Jihoon and himself, which would not bode well for their plans. No, he would simply befriend this man, and get information about his family. Nothing else.

The two men entered, dressed in clean suits and new leather shoes. Daniel hadn’t worn such an outfit since graduating from high school. Yet, he still carried himself in such a way that made him seem like he attended such parties all the time. Jihoon also did pretty well at acting the part, too. The hall they entered was huge, decorated with marble sculptures and full of white-clothed tables. The two of them took a glass of champagne from one of the waiters who offered, and walked around the hall, sniffing out any danger before sitting down in their designated seats. Again, very conveniently, the small table they were sat on at the back of the huge hall, had only three seats – meaning the two of them would get Ong Seungwoo all to themselves.

After a while, an elderly man appeared on the stage in front and coughed into the microphone, which everybody took as a sign to take their seats. Seungwoo, who the two men recognised from Jaehwan’s pictures, greeted the two as he sat down.

“Ong Seungwoo.” He introduced himself, putting out his hand for the two of them to shake.

“Choi Jimin.” Jihoon shook Seungwoo’s hand first, followed by Daniel.

“Park Daesung.” They politely nodded at each other before sitting down peacefully.

The ceremony went by without issue. Various prizes were given away, and every time, the whole hall clapped politely. When Mrs. Ong won her award, which Seungwoo clapped enthusiastically for, Jihoon took the opportunity to ask the man some questions.

“Mrs. Ong? Is she your relative?”

“Oh, yeah, we’re family.” He smiled proudly. It was kind of cute how much he seemed to admire his mother.

“Wow, then you must be an amazing scientist too, right?” Jihoon said, smiling, although Daniel knew that fake smile like the back of his own hand. Jihoon did not think of Mrs. Ong as a great scientist, but as a criminal that must be punished.

“Ah, I’m afraid not.” Seungwoo replied humbly. “I am actually more interested in other things, personally.” The two men nodded in understanding.

“Really? Like what?” Daniel pushed for more information.

“Well, I do modelling part time, since I’m very intrigued by the fashion scene, and then I study computer science at university.” He said quietly. “Although I’m not very good at it.” He added.

Again, they stop talking once the chatter in the hall died down, and the rest of the ceremony continued. At the end, the prize winners sat at a long table on the stage, and began to discuss various scientific matters. Mrs. Ong added her comments in every now and again, although neither Jihoon nor Daniel had the slightest clue what she was talking about.

However, at one point, there was something she said that shocked the both of them. She was discussing the idea of privilege and what roles it plays in the growth of a child, psychologically. Again, neither of the men could really understand what she was trying to say, but when she started to give examples, she started with “Even though I don’t have any children of my own, I can say with certainty that the results of this study suggest…”.

At the exact moment she said that, Seungwoo’s figure seemed to shrink a little in his seat. After a pause, Jihoon asked, “Oh, so how are you related to Mrs. Ong? I kind of assumed that you were her son.” He said with a curious tone. Of course, both Daniel and Jihoon knew that what Mrs. Ong had said was a complete lie – her son was in this very hall, watching her win prizes. But, perhaps by asking Seungwoo, they could find out why Mrs. Ong was refusing to acknowledge her child.

“Oh, no, um.” Seungwoo paused, a little startled. His eyes were a little shiny, and he was clearly upset, no matter how hard he was trying to hide it. “I’m her sister’s son. She’s my aunt.” He made this excuse quickly, but all three of them knew that it made no sense; why would her nephew come to watch her receive an award?

The whole ceremony ended without any further incidents.

“Well, now that’s over, I feel like drinking.” Daniel joked, as Jihoon had practiced with him beforehand.

“Yeah, I saw a few bars down the street from here while we were coming. Let’s go.” Jihoon added. The two of them then looked at Seungwoo, who was putting his blazer back on, presumably to leave. “Seungwoo, you wanna come with us?” Jihoon suggested.

“Uh…” Seungwoo seemed a little surprised. “Sure. Drinking seems like a good idea.” He smiled. “But I’m gonna go to the toilet for a quick piss before we go.” He said, and the other two agreed to wait for him.

When he walked away, Jihoon spoke to Daniel. “He seems harmless.” Daniel nodded in agreement. “In fact, I doubt he’s very close to Mrs. Ong at all, considering how she completely denies his existence.” He said quietly so that no one else could hear him.

“So why did you invite him to the bar?”

“Because… there must be a reason that she does so, right? Maybe there’s a family secret, or, I don’t know, but it’s the only idea I’ve got as to how to take her down.”

Seungwoo soon came back from the bathroom and they headed out to the nearest bar called “The Flying Squirrel”. It was quite a fancy bar, nicely decorated and clearly catered to slightly more well-off folk. Many others from the event, all dressed in their suits and dresses, also had the same idea, and the bar was pretty packed full of people.

The three of them ordered some drinks, and chatted for a while. Jihoon and Seungwoo seemed to talk to each other easily, and Daniel ended up not adding much to the conversation. An hour or so passed, and by this point Seungwoo was getting slightly tipsy. He was ripe for friendly interrogation. This was working out so easily, and while Daniel knew that this was a good thing, he couldn’t help but feel a little bored.

Daniel excused himself to the toilet, before the two of them could start getting more juicy information from the man. The toilets were located around the back of the building, which required going outside to access. It was dark, but being a slightly more upscale place, the alley was clean and void of any homeless people.

He walked down the side of the building, a light rain dripping down from the sky, towards the toilets. It was only when he looked up from his own feet that he saw someone else standing in the alleyway, staring at him.

Immediately, his adrenaline went up. Of course, it was nothing compared to the night he had cut that man’s hand off, but it was enough for Daniel’s senses to be heightened slightly. He suddenly felt the cold rain hitting his shoulders, and could see the crisp outline of the man in baggy, almost see-through clothes, leaning against the wall, waiting.

“Hey there.” A soft yet powerful voice called to him. Daniel stopped in his tracks, a little taken aback. The man was much shorter than him, yet seemed to carry off an aura of pure sexuality. His clothes were slightly damp, through which Daniel could clearly see two nipples and the outline of the man’s torso. He gulped, willing himself to not get distracted. But – why was this man standing out in the rain, in an alleyway, watching him? It was suspicious; it was-

“Hey, Sungwoon.” Another man called out from the end of the alleyway, which was connected to a main road.

“Jun, you haven’t been to see me in days!” The short man, presumably named Sungwoon, shouted back, suddenly pouting. The other older man paced up to Sungwoon and stood menacingly in front of him.

“Missed me? Or my money?” The man smirked, and Daniel considered going back inside instead of heading for the toilet.

“Isn’t that obvious?” Sungwoon replied, getting incredibly close to said man, who proceeded to grab the smaller man by the wrist and drag him off, back down the street. The man in see-through clothing wasn’t resisting, only laughing, so Daniel figured that this man must have been a simple prostitute searching for new customers.

Laughing at himself for being distracted by such things even for a second, he quickly went to the toilet before returning to the interrogation session. He also made a note to himself to jack off later.

-

The interrogation session went well, or so Jihoon thought. Daniel was getting a little impatient with Seungwoo, who was slowly becoming incomprehensible and was taking his time to confess the details of his life. Jihoon, however, managed to convince Seungwoo to hang out again some other time, and they exchanged numbers. Additionally, when Seungwoo finally passed out in a cab ride home to his flat (he had managed to tell the cab driver the address before passing out), he repeatedly mumbled the word “Mother” in his sleep. It was kind of cute, but also gross.

The two men carried him to his apartment, and unlocked the door with keys they found in said man’s pockets. They laid him down on his couch, inside. His apartment was a little run down and quite similar to the place that Daniel, Jihoon and Jaehwan had been sharing. It was therefore obvious that Seungwoo wasn’t given any money from his rich mother to live a comfortable life.

“Mm… Seungwoo?” A voice came from the dark hallway before the lights were turned on, revealing a sleepy-looking man, very slim and a face as small as a peanut.

“He’s passed out. We carried him back.” Daniel said, nothing but sweetness in his voice to show that they were not intruders.

“Oh, uh, thanks. And you are…?” He suddenly seemed more awake now, and a little more apprehensive at the realisation that there were strangers in his apartment, that was presumably shared with Seungwoo.

“Just friends. We drank together tonight.” Daniel explained.

“Okay. I’m his flatmate, Jinyoung.”

“Nice to meet you. Sorry to be bothersome, but we’re pretty tired, so I think we should get going, too.” Jihoon said, and the two of them quickly left. “Maybe see you another time.” He waved as he shut the door behind the two.

Jinyoung didn’t suspect a thing, and after checking that his best friend wasn’t in need of getting his stomach pumped (which wasn’t a rare occurrence), headed back to bed.

-

The next few days were uneventful; Daniel carried out his daily routine of getting some coffee, going to work, meaning discuss things with Jaehwan and Jihoon, working out at the gym and then heading back home. Anyone who didn’t know what kind of work he did would have thought he was a simple, ordinary guy.

Three days after pretty much nothing happened, he decided on a whim to head to a different corner shop to pick up his coffee. There was a new place just a couple of streets down from his apartment that had recently opened up. It didn’t seem like anything special; but he figured that he might as well give it a shot. Perhaps their coffee machines weren’t as clogged up as the old place, where the water would barely land in the cup if caution was not taken.

He got to the machine inside the store and slotted in the coins needed for an iced latte. The water poured out smoothly. As he was waiting for his coffee to be finished, however, a man walked past and he suddenly stiffened. The short guy from before – what was his name – Sungwoon, was browsing the isles in the same store, now dressed in slightly less revealing clothes than that rainy night. After a while of Daniel staring, Sungwoon must have felt a pair of eyes on him, as he snapped his head in the direction of Daniel, looking him straight in the eyes.

“What?” He asked a little rudely, looking Daniel up and down before displaying a look of slight recognition. “Oh, that kid in the alley from the other day?” He smiled knowingly, and approached the taller man, who for some reason felt very vulnerable. “Sorry I didn’t get to spend more time with you.” The short man whispered up at him as they were standing closer together now.

Daniel simply sighed, gritting his teeth and not wanting to get involved with the man, despite his body that currently had Goosebumps telling him to follow his animal instincts. It wasn’t like Daniel hadn’t had sex before. In fact, being the curious guy he was, he had done his fair share of experimentation. He didn’t need to hire a prostitute if he wanted to have a good fuck. That was what he told himself, but that didn’t explain why he felt a lot more nervous than usual.

Sungwoon, sensing Daniel’s nerves, took a step back and leant on the wall, crossing his arms. “I want a sandwich.” He said, looking at Daniel expectantly.

“Uh… then get one?” He replied, refusing to give in to the idea of buying this guy a meal for no reason other than the fact that he was hot. “I’m definitely not paying to get a random guy some food.” He added, and Sungwoon pouted a little.

“What? You’re a dangerous man, yet you’re scared of taking a sandwich from a corner shop?” He smirked in amusement, and again, Daniel felt vulnerable. What did he mean, dangerous man? And wait- was he suggesting that Daniel should steal from this store?

“Huh- I’m not gonna-” He started, but was interrupted.

“Fine.” Sungwoon sighed. “I’ll do it myself.” He walked away, casually grabbing a few items from the shelves of the store and shoving them into his bag. He did so as if he had done it a million times before. Daniel felt anxious, and not in a good way, wondering how on earth the store owner hadn’t noticed.

In annoyance, Daniel grabbed the man’s bag and took it away from him, which was fairly easy considering how much bigger he was than the other. He walked over to the shop counter and slammed the bag down, getting his money out. He couldn’t believe that he was actually paying for a prostitute’s meal. This was not what he had planned on doing this morning. After paying and seeing that the man was no longer in the shop’s isles, he went outside, where Sungwoon was standing with his arms crossed.

“You didn’t have to do that, you know.” He said, slight annoyance in his voice.

“I paid for your food and _you_ are annoyed at _me._ ” Daniel stated in disbelief. This guy was absolutely astonishing. Sungwoon uncrossed his arms and grabbed his bag back before suddenly stepping forward and slapping his lips onto Daniel’s. In shock, Daniel didn’t move, letting the prostitute press his soft lips into his own. After that short moment, Sungwoon stepped away, a little red now present in his cheeks.

“Good boy.” He said, smiling as he ran away, Daniel too confused to bother running after him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thx for reading chapter 2 :)
> 
> anyways, thank u to Cloudstar for the lovely comment on the last chapter - it really made my day!!


	3. Lee Daehwi I

Laughing until his stomach hurt, Daehwi ran across the bridge in his family’s garden, running away from his friends who were chasing him. Beer bottle in hand, he was caught by Guanlin, who pushed him over, causing the beer to pour onto the cobbled ground.

“Idiot.” Guanlin laughed, his breath stinking of alcohol. Daehwi did nothing but giggle in reply, hiccupping every now and again. “What if your parents see you running around like this in their garden?” He smiled at his friend.

“They don’t give a damn.” Daehwi replied dismissively. “It’s not like they’ve stopped me from drinking before.” He was vaguely thankful that his parents were so relaxed. By this point, Woojin had caught up with them after they had run ahead of him beforehand.

“Stop being gay and just sit down for a minute, god damn.” Woojin exclaimed, a little out of breath.

“Took you long enough to catch up.” Daehwi teased. “You should probably do some exercise every now and again.”

“Please, I could pick both you skinny arseholes up with just one arm.” He laughed and sat next to Daehwi on the ground, and Guanlin soon followed. Woojin looked up to the sky, admiring the clear starry night. “Pretty.”

“What, me?” Daehwi joked.

“No, the stars, you moron.”

“Are you saying that you dare to suggest that the heir to the Lee family bloodline is not pretty?” Guanlin gasps in fake shock.

“Ahh, don’t talk like that, I invited you guys to get drunk with me and forget about my responsibilities!” Daehwi moaned with a high-pitched voice.

“Responsibilities? You mean paying the class nerd to do your homework for you?” Woojin laughed at the privileged boy’s pout.

“Fuck you, you know I have to do more than that.” Daehwi lowered his head, watching the bubbling beer that had spilled.

“Yeah, I know.” Woojin replied apologetically. “But what kind of friend would I be if all I did was pity you?” He chuckled.

“True. You only like us ‘cuz we’re the only ones that don’t treat you like royalty.” Guanlin commented, taking a swig from his bottle. He offered the bottle to Woojin, who as usual had no interest in drinking. “You know, you never told me why you never drink.” Guanlin changed the subject that Daehwi was clearly reluctant to talk about.

“The taste is gross.” Woojin replied, shrugging.

“Yeah well good, ‘cuz I spilt my drink and the less you drink, the more I get to take from Guanlin.” Daehwi said, grabbing Guanlin’s bottle from his hands.

Daehwi felt his phone vibrate in his pocket. Sighing, he got the phone out. “It’d better not be Jisung asking me to pose for him again. I know I’m beautiful, but staying still for several hours is seriously not something my body is designed for.” He peered at his phone, and frowned slightly.

It was from an unknown number; the message ‘ _you should sleep soon_ ’ sent, two times, and then the word. Daehwi shivered while looking at his phone. He had been receiving messages from this number for a while now; almost all were simple greetings such as ‘good night’, ‘good morning’ and ‘have a good day’. He had never replied to them, knowing that it would likely only encourage the sender. He showed the messages to Woojin and Guanlin, who scoffed.

“Another admirer from school?” Guanlin suggested. This was the first time Daehwi’s friends had been around whilst he received one of these messages.

“Maybe. Weird.” Daehwi commented. “Should I reply?” He jokingly asked, not actually expecting to be encouraged.

“I mean, why not?” Guanlin replied.

“I dare you.” Woojin laughed. Daehwi looked at the messages again, and with a slightly buzzed feeling, replied to the mysterious texter: ‘ _do I know you?_ ’

Almost as soon as he had sent the message, Daehwi received a reply. ‘ _i know you_ ’. Woojin and Guanlin were peering over Daehwi’s shoulders to get a glimpse at the message.

“Creepy.” Guanlin commented. “Also, they didn’t answer your question.”

“Yeah… maybe I should just ignore them.” Daehwi giggled, putting his phone away.

-

After Guanlin and Woojin went home a few hours later, Daehwi checked his phone, which he had put on silent. To his shock, he now had 21 unread messages.

_‘i wish you knew me’_

_‘maybe you will one day’_

_‘although it’s not like I would be happy when I meet you’_

_‘you are so selfish, and spoilt’_

And various messages, all seeming to contradict each other and making barely any sense at all, had been sent, all from that same number. However, despite the creepiness of those messages, the last one  ended the conversation with the usual:

_‘anyway, good night. :-)’_

Daehwi chucked his phone on his desk and crashed in his soft, comfortable bed for the night.

-

The same week, he attended an art show opening for his family friend, Jisung. He only chose to attend out of formality, since his parents always nagged him to show courtesy towards family friends - something about reputation.

He was standing in the middle of the room with a glass of orange juice in hand, talking politely to people he didn’t know, about Jisung’s artworks. He took a minute to look over some of the art, but didn’t see anything that caught his eyes in particular – Jisung’s art was always very abstract, and his photography even more so, which really wasn’t Daehwi’s aesthetic. There were paintings and images of various people, with strange colours and an array of objects. There was one painting that Daehwi recognised as himself, from the pose sitting on a bench that he had held for approximately two hours while Jisung drew him. In the background, Jisung had painted in strings numbers and random words like ‘jealousy’, ‘anger’ and ‘twin’. Daehwi didn’t even bother trying to understand why Jisung had chosen to paint those words.

After a boring hour or so of making light conversation, Daehwi was ready to go home. He had made his appearance, as his parents had suggested, and now he would take his leave. Except, as Daehwi was getting ready to leave, Jisung himself approached the younger boy.

“Lee Daehwi!” Jisung shouted cheerfully. The man always had a goofy smile on his face, as if there was nothing wrong in the world. Such an expression was in clear contrast to his usually strange, depressing art. “I’d been hoping to see you here today.”

“Oh, why’s that?” Daehwi asked politely, although he wanted nothing more than to get out of this boring gallery to go home and chat to his friends.

“Truthfully,” Jisung started, and there was a sternness to his voice which Daehwi had hardly heard before, “I’ve been drawing something new. You’re in it. I’d like you to take a quick look.” He carried on, gesturing for Daehwi to follow. He did so, reluctantly. They walked to a corner of the room with a chair, a bag on top of it. Jisung opened the bag and took out a ripped piece of paper. “Here, take a look.”

Daehwi took the page from the older man and looked at the page. It was a rough drawing in charcoal – it almost looked like a child had drawn it, which was unusual for Jisung. There were eleven stickmen, each with a number ranging from 0 - 5 above their head, and two initials underneath each stickman. Each stick man looked slightly different, whether that be because of the height, eye shape, or head size.

“You’re this one.” Jisung pointed to a stick man in the front, with the initials L.D. written. It had a kind of square-shaped head and his face was the only one with a mouth. Above this stick figure’s head was the number 5. Daehwi tried to look closer, to see if he was missing something, or if there was some meaning behind the number that he was missing.

“Um, thanks for drawing me again?” Daehwi said, trying to be polite.

“No, don’t thank me. I actually have a couple of questions for you.” Jisung gave a quizzical glance towards Daehwi. “First of all, do these initials mean anything to you?”

“Uh, no, I don’t know.” He replied honestly. “I mean, anyone could have these initials, right?” He said, scanning the drawing.

“Yes, that’s true. I’m this one.” Jisung pointed to another stick man on the far right side of the page. There was a 0 above its head, and below read the initials Y.J.

“Oh. Well, no offense, but it doesn’t take much to draw stickmen, add a random number and write initials.” Daehwi was blunt with the man, knowing that he wouldn’t really mind.

“That’s your opinion.” Jisung said, putting the smile back on his face. “but whatever you think, I want you to take that drawing home with you. Perhaps you may recognise those initials over time.” He stated, before turning around and returning to the party. Daehwi left after putting the drawing into his bag, confused and annoyed that the older man had kept him from getting home needlessly.

As he was heading home, he received a new message from that same number: _‘wow, that gallery was boring, wasn’t it? :-)’._

*

 

  5             2           3             3           0            5            5            0          2            3            0

H.M.        O.S.        K.D.        P.J.        L.G.        L.D.        H.S.        B.J.        K.J.        P.W.        Y.J.

 

 

*

-

 “Eh? He knew that you went to a gallery? That’s creepy as fuck.” Guanlin commented while the three boys were taking a break from a skype-study session.

“Yeah, that means he must have been there, right?” Daehwi confided in his friends.

“But, like, he also always sends messages to you as you are going to bed, too. Isn’t that creepy? How does he know when you’re going to bed?” Woojin provided some input.

“Hmm, but I guess I go to bed at pretty much the same time every day, it was only the night the other week that I went to bed later than usual.”

“I mean, I don’t know for sure, but it seems dodgy to me. If there was someone at school who is doing this, why are they going all creeper-mode?” said Woojin.

“Woojin is right. It might not be anything, but maybe mention it to your parents. I’m sure they can figure something out.” Guanlin replied, a deep frown on his face. It usually took a lot for him to make such a face, so this was how Daehwi knew that, despite not feeling unsafe in any way, he ought to talk to an adult about it. The only problem was that his parents were both away on a business trip, as they often were, meaning that even if he told them, they couldn’t do much until they got back in a few weeks time.

After some more time preparing for their upcoming presentation for History class, they called it a night and went to bed. Daehwi brushed his teeth, took a shower and got into bed, ready to scroll through Instagram until he was sleepy enough to fall asleep. However, his phone had been flooded with messages from this unknown number. Intrigued, Daehwi opened then up – since they were text, it’s not like whoever was sending these messages knew whether he had read them or not.

_‘don’t listen to them’_

_‘they’re lying’_

_‘don’t listen to guanlin, he’s a lying bastard’_

_‘you don’t believe them, right?’_

_‘I’m only saying good night to you’_

_‘is there something wrong with that?’_

_‘I would kill for this kind of attention’_

_‘this is what you want, right?’_

_‘you want to be adored?’_

_‘you want to be loved.’_

Daehwi’s blood ran cold whilst reading the messages. How did this person know what they had been talking about earlier? Was Daehwi’s computer bugged, or his webcam hacked? Were they in his bedroom, or had they installed cameras inside his house?

As all these thoughts ran through his head, he didn’t notice that his phone was ringing until the screen popper up with the message ‘1 missed call’. His blood ran cold and he immediately threw his phone across the room, where it hit the wall but didn’t break.

A few silent seconds passed before his phone started to vibrate from the ground. Daehwi sat up in bed, staring intensely at the phone. He took some slow steps towards the device and picked it up, hands shaking uncontrollably. He swiped across his phone, answering and putting it up to his ear. All he heard on the other side was heavy breathing, and nothing more. It sounded like a man’s breathing, but Daehwi couldn’t be sure. Besides, he was too terrified right now to think clearly.

“Who the fuck is this?” He said, his voice stronger than he really felt. All he received in reply was heavy breathing, followed by a beep, signifying that the other had hung up on Daehwi.

A few seconds later, he received another message:

_'good night.'_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> daehwi doesn't seem to have any connection with jihoon/daniel's story... or does he??? ;)


	4. Park Woojin

Walking home, he couldn’t help but stumble over his own two feet. Despite being a cool night, beads of sweat were forming on Woojin’s forehead as he concentrated on the pavement ahead of him; trying his best to just not fall over. He had experienced these random waves of dizziness and heat a few times over the past month; but they had usually passed pretty quickly. Truthfully, he had been a little worried, especially because they were becoming more frequent and long-lasting recently, but it wasn’t like he could do much about it. His family were in far too much financial stress for him to ask to go to the doctors over something as minor as a few dizzy spells, or so he told himself.

Instead, he carried on home, barely able to keep himself up. He fell heavily onto his mattress back home, and closed his eyes to stop the world from spinning. He took many deep breaths in the hopes that his head would start working properly again. After a while of doing this, he fell asleep.

Except it wasn’t much longer until he woke up again. He sat suddenly in his bed, his hair now dishevelled and eyes puffy from the short sleep. He didn’t feel hot or dizzy anymore; just sticky from the left-over sweat.

He sighed, wishing that he had been able to sleep peacefully until the morning, but got out of bed anyway and headed to the shower. Inside the bathroom, with the shower on, the water began to wash away the memories from last night. However, in his half-sleepy trance, it took a while for him to notice the burning sensation on his back.

He suddenly jumped back from the water that felt as if it was scalding his skin, shouting in pain and slamming against the shower wall behind him. He checked the temperature of the water, only to see that it was on the same setting as usual. Confused, he tried putting part of his foot back under the water, only to quickly retract when his foot also felt that same extreme burning sensation. He quickly turned the shower off, frowning in pain from the still-prickling sensation on his back. He twisted his body so that he could look at his back in the bathroom mirror – and saw that it was completely red and irritated. In fact, it actually hurt to even touch with his finger.

But before he could ponder on the cause of the scorching hot water, he was startled by a knock on the bathroom door.

“Yeah?” He asked, expecting a family member to be needing the toilet or something similar. However, all that followed was another knock, this time louder. “I’m naked, don’t come in yet!” He said.

He started to dry himself off, deciding against taking a shower for now, and taking care not to hurt his already damaged skin. As he was doing so, there was a continuous knocking sound coming from the door. Every single time, it was getting louder and more forceful. At first, he just figured that it was actually his younger sister being impatient with him. However, soon enough the knocking was getting so loud that he doubted his sister would even be able to hit anything that hard – Woojin vaguely thought that if the banging got any harder, the door may start to loosen from its hinges.

“Wait, Damn it!” Woojin shouted. The knocking suddenly stopped. He finished getting dressed and opened the door forcefully, expecting to be met with his sister’s moody face. However, there was no one outside of the bathroom, only the darkness of the hallway.

He went back to bed, now in some clean pyjamas, shrugging off the incident. Perhaps his mind was over-exaggerating things, since he had barely gotten any sleep and was feeling a bit ill.

The next morning at breakfast time, he greeted his parents and younger sister with a nod. They similarly grunted in return, as always. It wasn’t that they didn’t like each other – it’s just that none of them were morning people. Woojin sat down at the table after pouring himself some dry cereal (they didn’t buy milk anymore, as they were trying to pay the bills on time this month) to wake himself up for the day of school ahead.

“Hey, Yerim.” Woojin started, still thinking over last night’s events. “You should be more patient. It takes me more than two seconds to get dressed, you know.” He said, and what she gave in return was a frown, her face confused.

“What are you talking about?” She asked, yawning.

“When you knocked on the bathroom door last night. You didn’t have to keep knocking. I heard you.” He explained, expecting her eyes to show some sign of recognition. However, all she did was scoff at him.

“I didn’t knock on the bathroom door last night, though.” Woojin also frowned at her statement. It seemed that the two of them often frowned at each other out of confusion. If it wasn’t her, then who was it? He knew that his parents wouldn’t do such a thing – Yerim had to be lying, right? She didn’t want to get in trouble for banging so loudly on the door last night. That must’ve been it.

-

The day went by fairly normally, aside from a few strange sightings. While sitting in class, dozing off a little from the lack of comfortable sleep last night, he felt a hand suddenly grabbing his shoulder, hard. As a reflex, he jumped up from his seat and looked behind him. However, as he was sat at the back of the class, there was nobody behind him. The class had all turned their heads around to see what was going on, and Woojin apologized, blushing as he sat down. He reasoned with himself that it must have been a simple muscle spasm, and his tired mind had, again, over-exaggerated a small sensation.

Later on, while he was hanging out with Daehwi and Guanlin at lunch time, there was another occurrence.

“I don’t know… I’m a bit scared.” Daehwi was discussing his stalking situation with the two of them, clearly shaken up by what had been happening. According to Daehwi, the calls had become more frequent. Every time he answered, there would only be heavy breathing, followed by the caller hanging up. Of course, Daehwi had tried blocking the number, only for a different number to soon send him similar messages and calls.

“Shouldn’t you tell the police?” Woojin suggested. “Stalking is illegal, after all.”

“I tried… but they didn’t seem interested at all. They kind of acted like they didn’t really believe me, or that I was exaggerating everything.” Daehwi explained.

“But what about showing them the messages and missed calls?” Guanlin also shared his advice.

“Of course, I tried to, but…” Daehwi swallowed, his eyes darting about as he was clearly trying to think about something intensely. “I just, I don’t know how but, by the time I opened my phone messages to show them, they were just… all gone. All of them.” The three of them fell into silence for a while, in both shock and thought. “Besides, I think they probably couldn’t be bothered to deal with me, since my house has all that security already.”

That was when Woojin saw something behind Daehwi. It wasn’t much, but he saw something dark and small move quickly across his vision. It seemed like it had limbs, although the way it ran across the floor was uncanny, and strange, as if it was faking a human running motion. He squinted, trying to look into the shadows underneath the table where the movement had been, but couldn’t make out anything that could have moved like that. Perhaps… it was just his mind playing tricks on him?

-

On the way home, Woojin decided that despite costing more, he ought to get the bus as opposed to walking. As soon as he walked out of school, he felt another dizzy spell coming on, and knew that if he walked home at this busy hour, his chances of getting run over by traffic would be very high.

Once he was inside the bus, sat on a seat amongst everyone else, he closed his eyes to take some deep breaths, again in an attempt to dispel his dizziness. He had read on the internet somewhere that breathing in until the count of four, then breathing out until the count of eight was a common breathing method for calming down.

One, two, three, four. One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight. That deep breath was nice, filling his lungs with oxygen.

One, two, three, four. One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight. He felt a slight buzz from the relaxation exercise.

One, two, three, four. One, two, th-

A hand grabbed his shoulder, this time even tighter than the last. It was grabbing his shoulder so hard that he thought his shoulder could have been crushed. He let out a yelp, grabbing his own shoulder to catch the hand. He shot up from his seat on the bus and turned around, only to be met with not only no hand on his shoulder, but also an elderly lady sitting behind him, who looked like she could barely carry her shopping bags, never mind crush his shoulder.

Again, everyone around him looked at him, as if expecting something to have happened. Woojin, sweat running down his forehead from a wave of heat that suddenly came over him, stood in silence until the bus arrived at the next stop. As soon as it did, he bolted off, not wanting to face the embarrassment of having shouted in the middle of a bus because of some weird sensations he was having.

As soon as he got off, the cold hair hit him and he felt a little better. Luckily, he was nearer his home now and could likely make it there without getting hit by a car. Before heading home, he sat down on the bus stop bench, catching his breath despite having run for only a few seconds.

“Um, excuse me, sir?” Woojin heard a male voice. He looked up, still breathing heavily, meeting a pair of concerned eyes. Woojin felt a little weird, not just because of the attention he had brought upon himself, but also because the man was clearly older than him, yet was addressing the younger as ‘sir’. It was strange. “I… don’t really know how to say this, but… uh…” The man struggled with his words. “I’m a doctor. And, well, I think… I can help you.”

“Huh?” Woojin said dumbly. What the hell was this guy talking about?

“I… noticed your symptoms on the bus just now.” He started. “You, uh, you’ve had these fevers for a while, no?” He said, and Woojin nodded slowly, not quite knowing whether to trust this so-called doctor or not. “And, that shoulder-grabbing… did it feel like someone suddenly seizing your shoulder?” He asked, and again, Woojin nodded. “Have you also, by chance, been seeing strange things?”

“I… I’m not so sure about that one.” Woojin admitted.

“Okay.” The man sat down beside Woojin, not too close. “I didn’t expect to find someone in these circumstances but… these are my details.” He took out a small business card and handed it to Woojin. “I’d really appreciate it if you can stop by sometime, so I can examine you and help you get better.”

“Um, sorry, but I think I’ll be fine.” Woojin said, not quite sure whether or not he believed his own words. His main thought was that this random man had just walked up to him and claimed that he can save Woojin from some kind of illness that he didn’t even kow he had. “Besides, I have no money.” He added.

“Don’t worry about that. This may sound a little strange, but I have no interest in gaining money from treating this… illness.” He said, pausing before the last word, as if unsure what word to use.

“…Ill…ness?” Woojin said, hoping for the doctor to explain.

“I will explain more if you come to my office. I am usually in the office in the mornings, apart from Sunday.” He said.

“Um, okay.” Woojin said, still weary of this mysterious person. Why had they suddenly taken an interest in him? What illness were they talking about? Was this person even a real doctor? Woojin got up from his seat, now feeling a lot less dizzy. “I should head home now. Goodbye…” He checked the business card. “Dr. Hwang Minhyun.” He finished before turning on his heels to make a swift return home.

-

Woojin had thrown the business card into his small bin next to his desk. He told himself that he would be insane to go to a man who claimed to be a doctor who could cure his illness. Firstly, he didn’t even explain what illness it was, which seemed highly suspicious. Secondly, he didn’t want any money, which seemed ridiculous to Woojin in this capitalist economy. Third, he was convinced that if he got just one night of good sleep, he would feel just dandy.

Woojin went to bed early, intending to get a full night’s rest. He tucked himself in under his warm blanket and shut his eyes; he felt himself dozing off almost immediately.

Except, he woke up in the middle of the night, again. This time, a banging noise woke him. He stirred, not really registering what the sound was for a while. After a few more knocks, however, he was awake, wide-eyed, lying in bed. The knocking wasn’t very loud – in fact, it only sounded like a tapping. But, like last night, it was getting louder and louder with each knock.

He tried to concentrate on the sound. Was the noise just inside his head? Was it simply the sound of rats running around? Where was the sound even coming from? He noted that the sound wasn’t coming from the direction of his bedroom door, but his window. That made sense, because the noise sounded like a tapping, now a light slapping, on glass.

He would have told himself that there were only some bugs hitting the window, but it was already clear by this point that the sound was, again, far too loud for such an easy explanation. He sat in bed, paralysed with fear, and listened to the noise getting louder and louder. He was amazed that the window hadn’t smashed by the time he decided to face his fears.

He didn’t know why, but his legs felt compelled to bring him out of bed and to walk towards the window. He grabbed the curtains, his heart pounding in his chest as he pulled them open forcefully.

In the dark night, it took a second or two to notice the dark silhouette standing in front of his house, directly across from his window. The figure was standing in the middle of the road, far away from the house, but was intimidating nonetheless. It was taller than a human should be, and skinnier, with black clothing draping over its figure, being blown by the weak wind. Woojin couldn’t make out it’s face, but somehow knew that the thing, person, was looking at him. It didn’t move, but Woojin still felt a cold sweat form over his body.

He stared at the figure for god knows how long. He knew that he ought to call out to his parents, or call the police or _something,_ but his body wouldn’t obey his mind. It was stuck in that same spot, standing in front of the window, staring at the figure for hours. It was only after the sun began to rise from the horizon, when his alarm clock suddenly rang, that he finally blinked and, like that, the figure was gone.

Woojin went straight to his desk-side bin to retrieve the business card from Dr. Hwang Minhyun.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i'll be off on holiday for three days but i'll try to write another chapter on thursday!! :) thank you for everyone's comments etc <3


	5. Lai Guanlin I

Opening his laptop for his next meeting with Jay, Guanlin gently rolled his head from side to side. It was soothing, and helped to get rid of some of the tenseness in his neck after a long day at school and his part-time job. He didn’t need the money desperately or anything, but his favourite group were going to have a comeback soon, and he wanted to be prepared to spend a lot of money on their merchandise, as he did with every comeback.

Luckily for him, he had found this way to make even more money on the side; feeding information to a man calling himself Jay (although Guanlin was certain that this was not the man’s real name).

Jay had first contacted him unexpectedly one night, when he was about to close his computer down to go to sleep. However, before he pressed the off button, his screen suddenly changed to an image of a rabbit mask. It took a few seconds for Guanlin to realise that it was not just a still image, but a moving one; similar to a skype chat, except there was no obvious way to end the call or close the window.

“Hello, Lai Guanlin.” A voice came from the person in the rabbit mask. The noise was slightly distorted, like listening to an old cassette tape. Guanlin sat in silence, blinking rapidly at the screen. Had he accidentally downloaded a virus? He had no idea what was going on. “No, this is not a virus, by the way.” The voice informed him, as if reading his thoughts. “You can call me Jay. I’m working for Mr. Park, and in order to carry out Mr. Park’s aims, I have deducted that you, Guanlin, will be of great use to us.” This man, Jay, carried on, as Guanlin sat in shock.

“H-how are you doing this? How do you know me?” Guanlin stuttered his words.

“I am a computer specialist – finding information about people, and hacking into their computers, is my role in this group. It was fairly easy to find you – you play a lot of online games, where I learnt a little about you, for example your habit of being loyal to those who you start out with, even if they are useless on your team.” Despite the audio being a little distorted, Guanlin can still make out how the man talks with a slightly lazy tone, as if slurring his words. “It was also very easy to find your computer and take over the screen, so that I could talk to you face-to-face.”

“B-but… this isn’t really face-to-face… since you’re wearing a mask.” Guanlin commented, not sure if he would even be safe trying to talk back to this man.

“This is a simple safety precaution. For both me and you.” The man replied matter-of-factly, despite the fact that Guanlin was basically shitting bricks at this point. “But anyway, we need you.”

“Um, why?” Guanlin said cautiously after pausing to process the situation for a few seconds.

“At your part-time job as a barista in the local psychiatric hospital, I believe that you are in a prime situation to be able to feed us information. Specifically, we need to find someone – their name, their behaviour, and anything else about them that you observe.”

Of course, it was a long time before Guanlin decided to accept the offer. Jay, while avoiding small details, had at first tried to convince Guanlin that this man was bad – something to do with raping patients in the hospital. Of course, while that sounded terrible, Guanlin had no reason to believe Jay, and wasn’t sure he wanted to get involved if it was true. However, after more convincing and pushing (as well as lots of bribery, including increased chances of being able to meet his idols at a fan sign event), after many weeks of Jay suddenly starting video calls with him, Guanlin accepted. The main reason he did so was because he knew that he wouldn’t be doing anything that seemed dangerous – just telling Jay whether he saw a man that fit a certain description.

That description was fairly vague, though. Somehow, at this psychiatric hospital, ‘a man with a slight beard, who is a little plump, and has dark hair, wearing a doctors coat’ was a common sight. Most of the male doctors there were a little chubby, and due to lack of time for shaving during their long shifts, usually had grown out stubble. That therefore meant that Guanlin provided a lot of information about many of the staff members, neither Jay nor himself knowing if this was the exact person that they were looking for. He would confirm their appearance, as well as give their names (if he managed to find out), their mannerisms and personalities.

Once, Guanlin asked, “If you specialise in finding information about people, how come you haven’t been able to find this guy?”. He had been wondering for a while, although after getting answers to all his other questions, he only expected a vague, unspecific reply.

“This hospital’s computer documentation is absolutely terrible. There’s hardly any electronic information, so now I am resorting to other means.” Jay had replied.

This day, however, Guanlin was determined to get real answers out of him. Although scary at first, Guanlin hadn’t been too concerned about Daehwi’s apparent stalking-situation. If he was being honest, he had suspected that it was just one of those strange people at school that looked up to Daehwi like he was a god. He thought that there was just some strange person who got a kick out of being creepy to a rich kid. Of course, as a friend, he had therefore encouraged Daehwi many times to carry on reporting the incidents, either to the police or teachers.

However, today, Daehwi had told Guanlin in person that whoever was sending those messages had finally made a threat. This was new, and Daehwi was understandably shaken up by it. Although the text had already apparently been deleted, it had apparently said something along the lines of ‘I want you to stop hanging out with Guanlin, or I’ll have to take more extreme measures. Guanlin is evil and you should only trust me’. Daehwi had also been going on about something to do with numbers and Initials, about how Guanlin’s number had gone up, or something. Daehwi had shoved a scrunched up piece of paper with several stickmen on it, and pointed to one of them with the initials ‘L.G.’ and the number ‘3’. It was weird that his friend was showing some random scribbles to him in such a situation, and he was therefore worried for his friend, both physically and mentally. The stress must have been taking a toll on the shorter boy.

After knowing the methods the guy would use to harass Daehwi, and possibly soon Guanlin himself, he couldn’t help but grow suspicious of Jay. The only person that Guanlin knew of that had the technological ability to do something like that to someone’s phone or computer was this man. That’s why he had decided to confront the man today.

“Hello, Guanlin.” The man popped up on screen at 6:03 P.M., as they had decided earlier.

“Hello.” He replied, trying to show strength behind his gaze, although he had no idea what the other was feeling, as he was still hiding behind that rabbit mask.

“Anything new?”

“Yes, actually.” Guanlin started, his shoulders slightly tense. “My friend, Lee Daehwi. Are you the one responsible for this?”

“Hmm? Lee Daehwi?” The man said, his voice going up in tone, showing intrigue. He suddenly started typing on his keyboard, clearly searching up the name.

“I know you don’t need to look him up – you’re harassing him. Why?!” He said, raising his voice a little. The man in the rabbit mask stopped typing and stayed silent for a minute before interlacing his fingers.

“I guarantee you that I am not doing anything to someone called Lee Daehwi.” He said monotonously. Guanlin could feel his adrenaline rising up, in both anger and fear.

“I have no reason to believe that, do I? Suddenly I start to feed you information – after you hack into my computer – and at around the same time, Daehwi starts to get weird messages that can just be deleted remotely, and our digital conversations are monitored?! That is definitely not a coincidence.” Guanlin was practically shouting at this point. His parents were working late tonight, so he didn’t have much to worry about there.

“Guanlin, please calm down. I do not know who Lee Daehwi is, but I can definitely look into it for you, and find whoever is responsible.” He said, his voice still expressionless.

“I- Just, I don’t know why you’re doing this, but please, don’t hurt my friend anymore. And leave me alone.” Guanlin replied, no longer looking into the rabbit mask’s eyes. There was no way that he could trust this guy – why had he even accepted to help this sketchy person in the first place? Guanlin quickly shut his laptop, which as far as he knew meant that Jay wouldn’t be able to see him anymore. He knew that the man probably had other ways of observing him – perhaps he had a car parked outside to look at his house all night, or had even installed cameras in Guanlin’s room. Who knew what this guy was capable of, especially to him, who did not have nearly the same amount of house security as Daehwi?

He let out a big sigh after wrapping himself under his blankets, knowing that this was likely not over, but just wanting to go to sleep and forget about any danger that he may or may not have been in.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i had a nice holiday in amsterdam!! and now, back to the grind of trying to finish this story :) this one is a little shorter and perhaps less interesting/intense than usual, but still important!


	6. Ha Sungwoon I

After the incident at the corner shop, Sungwoon had been seeing that man a lot. That wasn’t so surprising, as a good proportion of Sungwoon’s day was often spent standing around on street corners – he saw many faces every day. He had never found out this taller man’s name, but had noticed a few things about him; firstly, this man’s eyes would scan everything in sight, as if expecting danger to jump out at him at any moment; secondly, and this was difficult to spot due to being very well hidden, this guy would always carry around a knife. Sometimes, the guy had the blade attached somehow around his ankle, and when he was wearing a bulkier jacket, Sungwoon would spot a glimmer of light reflecting from the metal surface from an under pocket. From these two observations, Sungwoon quickly deducted that this man was certainly up to no good, most likely some kind of body guard or fighter.

One evening, while leaning against a wall outside of a local bar, Sungwoon saw the man stumble out from the place. The guy was clearly a little drunk, as he was wobbling while he tried to walk along the street. However, these imbalances quickly went away when the man seemed to notice something troublesome. No one had made a scene, as far as Sungwoon knew, but he could see from not far away there was a group of businessmen approaching the bar, and therefore in the direction of both Daniel and Sungwoon. Daniel’s shoulders had tensed up, and he was now holding a defensive stance.

Sungwoon swooped right in, knowing that this was the perfect opportunity for him. He strolled up to the man, placing his hand on his bicep seductively. The guy jumped a little, having not noticed Sungwoon, but soon showed recognition in his eyes. He opened his mouth to speak, a frown on his face, but Sungwoon spoke first.

“Don’t draw attention to yourself.” Sungwoon slid his hand around the man’s arms, which were rather muscular, and pulled him to the side of the pavement, out of the businessmen’s way. “Put your hands on my hips.” He ordered, making his voice as soothing as possible. The other man, instead of complying, simply stared at the businessmen approaching. Sungwoon tutted before grabbing the man’s heart-shaped face, pulling it to look at him. “I’m saving your ass. Listen to me.” He ordered, his voice a little firmer this time. “If you keep staring at them like that, they’ll notice you.”

The businessmen, one of whom Sungwoon noticed had one hand missing, had almost approached them at this point, and one or two of them were staring right at the man. They were clearly suspicious of this muscular guy that was incredibly tense after seeing their presence.

“Forget it.” Sungwoon sighed, knowing that this guy had already fucked this situation up for himself. He grabbed the man’s hand tightly and pulled it after him as he began to run away from the men. The men didn’t make any sign to chase after the two of them, but Sungwoon feared that if they had stayed there any longer, they may have recognised this taller man. Sungwoon didn’t know what the man had done, but he knew in his gut that he didn’t want to be seen by those businessmen.

Luckily, the man ran with him. They ran for a few minutes, Sungwoon leading the two of them around the back of the bar, down a dark alleyway and straight to the front of an apartment block.

“S-Sungwoon.” The man breathed heavily, slightly out of breath. “Thanks, uh, for helping.” He rubbed the back of his own head.

“Yeah, your drunk ass wasn’t any help.” He laughed in return. If he wanted this guy to help him, he needed him alive, at least. “Come in, I’ll make you some coffee so you can sober up before going home.”

He was surprised when the other didn’t resist and came inside that easily. They walked up several flights of stairs to Sungwoon’s apartment, which was a little shabby but nothing too bad. He brewed up some coffee and plonked it in front of the man, who seemed a little out of it, sitting on Sungwoon’s couch with his eyes glossed over.

“Uh, here you go.” Sungwoon said, snapping the guy out of his trance. “By the way, you never told me your name.” He casually mentioned.

“Uh…” The guy looked Sungwoon straight in the eyes, clearly trying to assess whether he was to be trusted with such information as a name. “Daniel.” He replied.

“Great, I can finally put a name to the face.” He smirked at Daniel after also sitting down on the other side of the couch. The rest of the time they spent together that day was spent mostly in silence, sipping at their hot beverages. Daniel went home, a little more sober, after thanking Sungwoon a few more times.

Sungwoon headed to his bathroom to take a bath; he had missed a while day’s worth of work by this point, which was a vague worry in the back of his mind, but nothing compared to what he hoped to accomplish by befriending Daniel.

He looked into his bathroom mirror to observe his face in the reflection. He stroked his jawline and analysed every crease, watching himself exist, even if just for this moment.

-

He didn’t hear from Daniel for a few days after that. But Sungwoon was kept busy with both old and new customers – for some reason, he was receiving a lot of business suddenly. It definitely took a toll on his body, but he needed the money to support himself. It was his job – just like any construction site builder or regular office worker. He had worked briefly in a coffee shop before and this honestly wasn’t so different. Instead of selling coffee, he was selling his body. Sometimes there were decent customers and sometimes there were shitty customers. But that was what he was paid to put up with.

It was now Wednesday – the only day he would take off every week. It was his time to pamper himself; he would go grab a nice meal, perhaps do some shopping, or just sit at home listening to music and chilling out. Today, he decided to take a trip to the cinema and watch a movie. He didn’t exactly have any friends, so he always went alone, but that was fine with him. He didn’t need friends, because the only person that he could truly trust was himself.

He treated himself to a large box of popcorn, and sat down to watch this new horror movie. It wasn’t spectacular, but it had been hyped up and had a few famous actors in it. During the movie, Sungwoon couldn’t help but feel as if he was being watched. Although, he got this feeling very often and it was usually nothing. Therefore, he chose to ignore the sensation of the hair on the back of his neck prickling.

After the film’s credits began to roll, he began to make his way home. It was now getting darker outside, but he was used to walking through dark, dodgy streets. Today, however, was different. He couldn’t shake off that feeling of being watched, and his senses were hence enhanced while he kept a look out for any sign of someone watching or following him.

As he walked through the park, a shortcut towards his apartment, this feeling only got more intense. He decided that it may be best to make a run for it – and he started to do so. However, before he could really pick up momentum, his arm was grabbed, and he barely had a thought before he was slammed into the ground with a huge force. Of course, he began to fight back, flailing his arms around, but he really wasn’t a fighter, having grown up with no opportunities to gain muscle mass.

The first punch took him by surprise – he wasn’t used to this anymore. He clutched at his stomach, which felt like it had been kicked out of him. Another punch came, this time to his face. Sungwoon breathed in sharply. He could have screamed, but knew that it would be useless. The last time he had called for help, things only got worse for him.

That’s right; it was useless for him to resist. The only thing he could do was wait for this to be over.

There were a few more punches, and some slurred speech.

“He’s put on some weight.” One of the man’s voices commented.

“But he’s still the same.”

“Yeah, hasn’t really changed at all.”

After that, Sungwoon began to tune out of the current situation; something he hadn’t done in a while, but it was previously a second nature to him. He didn’t listen to the voices, and didn’t react to the hits anymore. Of course, his body hurt, and he was fairly certain that one of his ribs must have been broken by now, but he knew that all he had to do was endure this.

As he had predicted, the men soon got bored of hitting him. Obviously not wanting to commit murder, they left Sungwoon there, barely conscious, but not in any mortal danger. He laid on the ground of the dark park for a while, slowly bringing his mind back to the moment. With that came increased awareness of the pain all over his body, especially around his stomach area. There was only a little blood beading from the punch to the face, which felt like it had torn the skin around his lips slightly.

Before he could gather enough strength to get himself up and limp home, he suddenly felt a pair of warm hands grab his shoulders and start to gently shake him.

“Sungwoon? You awake?” Daniel’s voice called out to him. Sungwoon slowly nodded, briefly wondering how the man had found him here. Sungwoon would have laughed if he hadn’t just been beaten up – this situation was almost ridiculous, as if the hurt princess was being saved by a strong prince.

Daniel slowly helped Sungwoon on to his feet, letting him lean on the taller man. Together, they made their way back to Sungwoon’s apartment. If not for Daniel, Sungwoon was sure that he wouldn’t have made it back so quickly, especially considering how dizzy he felt at that moment.

Daniel sat Sungwoon down on the couch, and he winced at the pain of using his stomach muscles to sit up straight.

“Is something broken?” Daniel said in a calm voice.

“Probably.” Sungwoon replied.

“Let me see.” The man said, and crouched down in front of the shorter man, expecting Sungwoon to point out the place of discomfort.

“Uh, I’m fine.” He said, not wanting to expose his torso to Daniel. It may have seemed strange for a prostitute to be worried about showing his body; but he had carefully planned how his relationship with Daniel would lead to the strong man’s compliance with Sungwoon’s wishes. That plan suggested that getting naked in front of Daniel, even partially, would have to be at a much later time.

“I need to see, otherwise I can’t see how to help.” Daniel frowned. Sighing, and figuring that he would try to figure out a new plan later, he began to undo his shirt, slowly taking it off to reveal his torso.

Daniel was, understandably, taken aback. Most people, aside from drunken customers, often were. He knew that his body had been mutilated beyond compare; in fact, he was often thankful that his body still looked like a body at all. Daniel’s eyes scanned Sungwoon’s scar-covered body quickly, before he blinked and his gaze was focused again.

Daniel proceeded to inspect Sungwoon’s bruises closely, lightly touching the injured areas. Sungwoon winced a little when he brushed his fingers over the rib that he figured was broken, and Daniel stopped touching.

“That’s where you think it’s broken, right?” Daniel asked and Sungwoon nodded. “Don’t worry, it’s not. Just badly bruised, or at most fractured. You just need to rest for a week or so.” He said matter-of-factly.

“And why should I take your word over an actual doctor’s?” Sungwoon was suspicious of the advice. Daniel looked into Sungwoon’s eyes again, again clearly assessing whether or not he should give Sungwoon an answer.

“I know some stuff. And that’s definitely not a broken rib.” He replied. Sungwoon raised his eyebrows, unsatisfied with the answer, but accepting it nonetheless.

“How did you find me, anyway?” Sungwoon suddenly remembered how ridiculous this chance-encounter was.

“I was taking a walk through the park and saw those two guys running away… and then I saw you.” He explained, and Sungwoon believed him. A silence followed before Daniel spoke again. “Do you know who those guys were?”

“No.” Sungwoon replied.

“So, it was just a mugging or something?” He asked.

“Uh, yeah.” Sungwoon lied, knowing full well that the guys hadn’t taken any of his cash or any of his other belongings.

-

Over the next few days, Sungwoon stayed inside his apartment, as Daniel had suggested. Daniel, to Sungwoon’s surprise, had visited every day with a bag of food.

“You can’t go out to get food, so I’ll just get some for you.” He had reasoned with Sungwoon while chopping up some meat to prepare a meal. His cooking wasn’t great, but it was edible, and Sungwoon was grateful that he didn’t have to cook himself, since even standing up was painful.

Daniel was also pretty good company – he told good jokes and it was also quite hilarious when the younger man started talking about cats, because he got really excited, like a young boy.

However, Sungwoon couldn’t help but feel that Daniel was only making the effort because of pity. The way Daniel was looking at him, like he was a hurt puppy, just screamed ‘I pity you’. Usually, customers would be shocked at his scars but soon forget, only wanting a way to get off. But somehow, Sungwoon felt that Daniel’s reaction was worse. He didn’t want to be seen as a poor soul that needed protection. He didn’t want people to think that he was weak. He knew himself that he was anything but weak; he had been the one to save himself from his past, after all. No one else. Just Sungwoon.

“Stop looking at me like that.” Sungwoon spoke up after a while of Daniel visiting him every day. Truthfully, Sungwoon was feeling a lot better now, and despite telling Daniel this, he still insisted on visiting.

“Huh?”

“Like that! That look of pity.” Sungwoon pointed right at the taller man’s face. “Don’t pity me.” Daniel only replied with silence, clearly not knowing how to reply.

-

More days passed, and they grew closer. Sungwoon went back to work, but Daniel still visited often. They ate together, watched movies, and chatted about nothing until 4 in the morning.

“Let’s play a game.” Sungwoon suddenly spoke up one night. Now was the perfect opportunity to find out more about Daniel – about how useful he could realistically be to Sungwoon’s plans.

“What game?”

“We have to answer questions about ourselves.” He stated simply.

“That’s not a game.” Daniel laughed. “That’s just interrogation.”

“That’s not true – it’s a game because we can only ask yes or no questions, and if the answer is yes, the asker gets a point.”

“But it could go on forever!”

“Well, you can technically go on with Skyrim forever, but it’s still a game!” Sungwoon carried on teasing Daniel to play. “Oh, and you have to tell the truth.” He made sure to look into Daniel’s eyes as he said this. Daniel looked back, knowingly. Sungwoon was sure that Daniel also had many questions to ask him.

“Okay, I’ll go first.” Daniel stated. “Do you enjoy having sex with your customers?” Daniel asked. A fairly safe question, considering the possibilities.

“No.” Sungwoon replied easily. “Have you ever been to prison?” Sungwoon asked.

“Nope. Have you?” They continued this for a while; flittering back and forth between superficial questions (“Do you like anal?”) to slightly more serious (“Do you still talk to your parents?”), but never quite getting to the questions that the both of them _really_ wanted to ask.

That was, until Daniel broke the chain. “Who gave you those scars?” He asked.

“That’s not a yes or no question.” Sungwoon replied.

“Okay, then, did your parents give you those scars?” He corrected his original question. Sungwoon figured that most people who had seen his scars would assume that his parents gave them to him – which would have been a fair guess, but not right.

“No.” He replied truthfully. “Do those businessmen from the other week want to hurt you?”

“…No.” He said, but stated it as more of a question than an answer. “Were those guys who beat you up really just muggers?”

“…No.” Sungwoon hesitated to reply. “Are you the reason that business man we saw the other week had one hand missing?” Sungwoon took a long shot, not really thinking he was correct. It had simply been a thought that was bugging him. Daniel was silent for a moment before replying.

“Yes.” His voice was deeper than it had been before. “Do you know what I do?” Daniel asked cautiously. “Y’know, for a living.”

“No.” Sungwoon stated, suddenly wanting to expand. “I… just made a few assumptions based on what I’ve seen.” He said, choosing his words carefully. He was surprised that he was being so open, and that the other man was also being so truthful, when neither of them had even taken a sip of alcohol that night. “Have you ever killed someone?”

“…No.” Daniel replied again. “But I’ve been prepared for that to happen for a while now.” He said, also joining in with the explanation of answers. “Can I…” He began, swallowing his words before continuing “See your scars again?” He asked, his eyes wide open with both curiosity and fear.

“…Why?” Sungwoon broke the chain of questions.

“I don’t know, I just- I need to.” He stammered on his words. Sungwoon could hear through his voice that the request did not have any sexual or sadistic intent behind it. That was why he decided to unbutton his shirt to expose his torso again. Daniel looked over Sungwoon’s body, and for the first time in a while, he felt self-conscious. Soon, Daniel proceeded to run his fingers over Sungwoon’s torso, feeling the bumps of each healed cut and the rough texture of burnt skin. Of course, everything had healed now, so none of this hurt Sungwoon, but he couldn’t help but shiver a little at Daniel’s light touch.

“Y-you wanna see my back?” He asked. He never really saw his back, but he knew it was just as bad. Sungwoon calmed himself down, reasoning with himself that in order to get Daniel to do what he wanted, he must show him the reasons for Sungwoon’s plans. He needed Daniel to want to kill the people who did this to him. He turned around to show Daniel his back. Again, he felt light touches all over his back.

“Who did this?” Daniel soon said, his voice incredibly stern and serious. Sungwoon turned back to see the man’s face, which was similarly solemn. Sungwoon put his shirt back on before replying.

“I only know him as… ‘The Host’.” Sungwoon replied, not able to look Daniel in the eye any longer. Being completely honest with himself, he felt worried telling Daniel the man’s name so soon. He had planned to build a relationship with Daniel over the course of months before doing so; he had even expected to have to sleep with him a few times before Daniel would even ask. But, and to Sungwoon’s surprise, Daniel’s eyes told him that he was already prepared to kill.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thanks to those who are still reading, and even more so to you guys who have been leaving comments!! <3


	7. Kim Jaehwan I

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> after some proper planning, i decided that this story will be 13 chapters long! each member will have their own chapter, and two will get another chapter each :)

To say that he currently had a lot on his plate was an understatement. First of all, he was investigating full-time who this mystery man was – the man who had raped Jihoon’s mother – to no avail. Secondly, he had this new issue of a boy called Lee Daehwi being stalked. And last of all, Daniel had come to him, asking him for a favour. While he had no inclination or obligation to carry out this favour, Daniel’s display of both anger and passion for this cause was hard for the genius to turn down.

So, he got to work. Daniel had asked him to find someone called ‘The Host’. While incredibly vague, and having been given not much more information, he still searched the deep web thoroughly for such a name. He came across many people calling themselves by this name, but one clue (namely, Daniel mentioning scars) helped him to trickle it down to one particular internet user. This guy, while very difficult to find, had his own webpage titled ‘films brought to you by The Host’.

It was very clear to Jaehwan what kind of site this was, only from the home page. Video thumbnails of bloodied bodies, with titles such as ‘Viewer’s Requests #104’ and ‘The Host’s Fun Friday #47’, showed to Jaehwan that this was some kind of torture site. There were hundreds of videos, none of which Jaehwan could bring himself to click on, that were depicting someone being mutilated, humiliated or tortured. Based on the view count, these videos were popular, too. Jaehwan took a short browse through the site, making sure not to let himself watch any of these disgusting videos, as he knew he wouldn’t be able to stomach it.

Unable to look at the violent thumbnails anymore, Jaehwan quickly typed an email to Daniel with the link to the site before closing his computer. Just as he had finished this, Jihoon walking into Jaehwan’s office.

“Hey, man.” Jihoon greeted his co-worker and friend. “What’s up?” He sat down on Jaehwan’s desk.

“Nothin’ much, really. Been getting a few connections to give me more information, but so far, nothing of any real interest.” Jaehwan filled in his boss. Not only was there Guanlin, but also a few other people that Jaehwan had found and convinced to do some information-gathering for him. There was one guy working at a gas station near the hospital; he was also a drug dealer, which Jaehwan overlooked for the sake of trying to find this mysterious rapist. There was also a patient who was recently discharged from another nearby hospital that had claimed to be raped by someone of a similar description. However, none of these sources had really given any valuable information. Not yet, anyway.

Jihoon sighed. “You’re doing a good job. Couldn’t have got this far without you, and I’m sure we won’t get any further without you, either.” Jihoon smiled warmly.

“Yeah, don’t worry, we’ll find the guy eventually.”

“And how about Hwang Minhyun?”

“Again, nothing much new. He’s been carrying on that unofficial research of his, but he seems to be hand-writing most of his findings, so I can’t get any more information of what it is. Could be legal, could be completely dodgy, I have no idea.”

“Hmm… I’ll need to do something about that.” Jihoon pondered, trying to think of some possible courses of action to get more information, and hence revenge material, about the doctor with a seemingly perfect track record. “I’ll send him another letter. Pressure him, maybe crack him. And in the meantime, maybe we ought to figure out a plan to go and find these hand-written research notes.”

-

While Jihoon carried on planning out his scheme, Jaehwan continued to carry on his side-projects. He now had to figure out who exactly was bothering Lee Daehwi, so that he could get Guanlin back on his side to feed him more information. It was rather easy to find Daehwi, Guanlin’s school friend and the son of a prestigious family. His parents were very successful investors, and they lived in a fancy house on the outskirts of Seoul. In the house, they had a lot of physical security measures in place, for example CCTV, secure alarm systems, and Jaehwan guessed that they likely also had several panic rooms. However, their digital security wasn’t the greatest, so Jaehwan had no problem checking out Daehwi’s computer to find any issues.

Jaehwan checked Daehwi’s online accounts first. For a while, there was nothing, but while inspecting his computer for any possible corrupt files, something popped up on screen. This was like how Jaehwan would often speak to his connections; through an un-closable pop up box. However, this person used a text box, similar to an Instant Messaging service, unlike Jaehwan, who used video.

 _‘good morning, Daehwi.’_ The message, with no name attached, had typed into the text box.

 _‘what you looking through your hard drive for?’_ another message popped up.

Jaehwan didn’t do anything else, knowing instinctively that this was the stalker that Guanlin had spoken about. Instead, he began typing a reply, knowing that he had to keep the guy connected if he had any chance of tracking who it was.

 _‘who is this?’_ Jaehwan replied, and pressed enter to send. Before the other person could start typing again, Jaehwan quickly connected a special memory stick to his computer. With this memory stick, he could activate a search and quickly find the source of this person.

 _‘oh, you’re talking to me again?’_ the person replied. _‘after all this time, I thought you were ignoring me. It’s been weeks since your last reply, after all.’_ The messages read.

 _‘just… please, tell me who you are and what you want.’_ Jaehwan sent another message, waiting for his memory stick to start inconspicuously scanning the hacker. Unless this person was on the same level or better than Jaehwan, he was certain that this technology he had made would work. He just needed more time.

_‘I want to talk to you. That’s what I want.’_

The light on the memory stick was flashing fast, indicating the workings of Jaehwan’s code against this person’s software.

_‘but it doesn’t matter what I want, does it? Not really’_

The flickering was so fast now that it was simply one light, the human eye unable to distinguish the different flashes.

_‘I wish I was you’_

Jaehwan’s computer was working hard, the fan giving off a loud noise at this point.

_‘maybe, in a way, I already am.’_

Jaehwan switched his eyes to the screen, knowing that he had almost succeeded.

_‘maybe, I will become you.’_

Many more messages of a similar confusing nature were being sent to the message box. Jaehwan frowned reading the messages, trying to understand what the person was talking about, but also thankful that the person was using time.

And then, the memory stick stopped flashing. His phone lit up with automated messages he had programmed to be sent in a circumstance such as this; messages giving the information of this person’s IP address. Jaehwan ignored the messages appearing on screen now, instead choosing to investigate the source of this person. He did a quick IP search on another computer of his, searching databases and information quickly before deducting a precise location. The map pointed to an apartment block in Seoul; in small writing was written an apartment number. By this point, the other person had stopped talking and closed the chat box on Daehwi’s computer, and Jaehwan chose to shut off his connection to the boy’s computer.

Again, he got to work with searching up the address and doing what he did best – finding information. He soon found out that the apartment was rented by two men in their early twenties. It was strange that their names hadn’t been mentioned anywhere on the tenancy agreement he found, but Jaehwan knew that there were other ways of finding these guys’ identities. He found their computers through the information he already had and similarly got to work to remotely examine their computer’s history and files.

The first computer, who was apparently owned by someone called ‘Bae Jinyoung’, was a piece of cake to hack into. Just from making a quick search through the computer, Jaehwan knew that there was likely nothing of interest here. The main reasoning for that was because all this guy’s so-called ‘personal’ files weren’t protected in any way, ready for anyone to look at. He therefore knew that this guy was likely not behind the stalking, if he couldn’t even protect his own passport number.

Jaehwan therefore swiftly moved on to the next and last computer in the flat. This was where Jaehwan began to grow suspicious, as from the get-go, the protection on this computer was far superior to Bae Jinyoung’s. It took a while of playing around, but Jaehwan soon got past the various levels of security that had been coded into the computer’s core programming before breaking through to this guy’s personal files, where Jaehwan could finally see the guy’s name: Ong Seungwoo.

Jaehwan frowned, knowing that name very clearly from the recent events involving his work. Jihoon and Daniel had managed to grow somewhat closer to the man, trying to gain more information that could be used to hurt Mrs. Ong. But it was too soon to make any conclusions – Jaehwan couldn’t be sure that Seungwoo was the person terrorising Daehwi, right? And so, Jaehwan continued forth, inspecting each and every folder and programme installed on Seungwoo’s computer. It wasn’t longer than an hour before he found the clear-cut evidence he needed.

Hidden pretty deep in his picture folder was another folder titled ‘Photography’. Jaehwan opened said folder and immediately a whole folder of countless images of a boy that Jaehwan recognised as Lee Daehwi popped up into the screen. He didn’t look at them all, but there must have been a few hundred at least. Most of them seemed to have been taken from far away, some more close. Some were of the boy studying at school, and others were of him sleeping in his bed. Jaehwan didn’t spend too long looking at these pictures before he decided that he ought to inform Jihoon.

-

“He’s stalking someone?!” Jihoon exclaimed in surprise. “Damn, he didn’t seem the type. Any idea why he’s doing it?”

“Nope. There are the pictures, and some logs of their conversations, but even after reading through them, I couldn’t find any obvious reason why he would be doing this.” Jaehwan admitted. “But, Seungwoo does keep telling Daehwi that he’s jealous, that Daehwi is lucky, and whatnot. Perhaps Daehwi has something Seungwoo doesn’t have, that he wants?”

“Hmm…” Jihoon pondered, his eyes glazing over in intrigue. “Whatever the cause… I think we may have finally found a way to bring Mrs. Ong down.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> another shorter one, but again, very important to the plot~
> 
> thank you again for everyone that commented, gave kudos, followed or read!! <3


	8. Ong Seongwoo I

That conversation was strange. Seungwoo was expecting the usual case of him sending a few messages to Daehwi, only to be ignored. However, this time, the boy had actually replied to him. Seungwoo pondered on what could have been the cause of this change; perhaps Daehwi was being pushed to his edge? That would make sense, as Seungwoo knew too well how no figure of authority was willing to help Daehwi, despite his pleading. In a way, that annoyed Seungwoo, because the boy should be listened to, right? Surely, the heir to his family name should have some kind of value to the police, no?

But on the other hand, Seungwoo was rather relieved. While he was certain that the police wouldn’t be able to trace him, as he had always erased his tracks after sending the boy messages, he knew that if they got involved, it would only be a hindrance. He wanted to speak to the boy. He wanted to see him.

And then, he felt another emotion; sadness. He hadn’t intended to make Daehwi feel threatened at all. Yes, he knew he had sometimes said a few weird things, but he didn’t have any ill intentions. All he wanted was to see the boy, get to know him a little, and live through the boy. He certainly didn’t have any plans to hurt him or his friends.

Sighing, Seungwoo turned off his computer and grabbed his backpack loaded with his digital camera and some food. He hadn’t seen Daehwi in days by this point; the boy had been smart enough to cover his webcam with some kind of tape. Seungwoo still had access to this microphone, but the boy didn’t spend much time there anymore, and usually spent it alone, so there wasn’t much to be gained from the microphone. So, Seungwoo had to resort to other methods of getting to know the boy that he wished he was; by watching him in person. His roommate, Jinyoung, was sound asleep, ready to wake up early for his new modelling job in the morning, so he exited the flat easily.

Seungwoo skipped happily down the sidewalk, the street dark. He made the familiar route towards the mansion, a mere 30 minute walk away, and walked around the property into the neighbour’s garden. This garden not only had far less physical security than the Lee household’s, but also had many bushes to hide in, and a hill with a perfect view of Daehwi’s home. He sat down at his usual spot in front of some bushes and set up his camera equipment. Despite being around 1AM, Daehwi seemed to still be awake. He wasn’t in his room, but in the living room, playing Skyrim on their platinum TV screen. He seemed to be having a good time, as Seungwoo could see when he zoomed his camera in to the window. Seungwoo had played Skyrim before at a friend’s place once, but had never been able to afford an actual PlayStation, nor a screen that large.

He recorded the boy playing his games and sat back, drinking the coffee he had brought with him. While Daehwi sat inside the warm house, playing his computer games using state-of-the-art technology, Seungwoo was sat on a cold, muddy hill drinking instant coffee. Of course, this was partly by choice, as Seungwoo could technically be sleeping in his warm bed. But that didn’t bring him any satisfaction anymore. He wanted more.

As he watched the boy play, his mind wondered off to the deepest crevices of his imagination. He wondered why this boy had so much more than him; why did this boy’s parents love him so dearly? Why did they shower him with protection, education and love? How had this boy been so lucky that his parents actually loved him, whereas Seungwoo, who was born into an equally privileged family, had to live life like this; being pushed away like an ugly duckling, only to be forgotten about and ignored when pleading for love?

He didn’t often let his mind wander this far, because it only got him down, and he hated feeling down. But tonight, perhaps because his coffee tasted particularly shitty, he let it wander. He tried to think of all the things he had done wrong – had he not been charismatic enough at that party when he was 10 years old? Was it because he didn’t get a perfect score on his science test back in Middle School? Or maybe his mother thought that it was embarrassing to have a son that told jokes all the time, instead of taking life seriously. Little did she know, Seungwoo was indeed taking life seriously. Telling jokes was his way to hide that.

Perhaps an hour or two later, Seungwoo was snapped out of his spiral of negative thoughts by the light in the living room turning off. Daehwi had turned off his game and was heading upstairs. Soon enough, he appeared in his bedroom and entered his en-suite bathroom to get ready for bed. Of course, Seungwoo didn’t have a camera in the bathroom, but he figured that everyone deserved even just a little privacy.

When the boy came out, drying his hair with a towel and plopping into bed to get a good night’s rest, Seungwoo was reminded of why he was doing this. He sighed, breathing in the cool night’s air. He smiled, imagining himself as Daehwi. He imagined that his mother had loved him and accepted him as her family. He imagined that he had a family that supported him in his goals and comforted him when he failed. He imagined a life where he didn’t have to starve himself just so that he could be presentable for the next photoshoot to be able to pay the bills on time.

Until sunrise, he spent the rest of the night imagining just how different his life would be if he and Daehwi had been born in each other’s shoes.

-

The next day, after Seungwoo’s short morning nap, he was awoken by a loud banging at his bedroom door.

“Hey, Seungwoo!” He heard his flatmate shout at him. He stirred in his bed, wondering why his usually quiet flatmate would be waking him up so loudly. “There’s some policemen waiting for you in the living room.” He carried on banging on Seungwoo’s bedroom door. Seungwoo understandably frowned, his body tensing. Had someone figured out that he was, although he hated the word, _stalking_ Daehwi? Or was this something completely unrelated? Had his mother been caught in some kind of accident?

He shot out of bed and opened the door, his bed head meeting Jinyoung. “What’s going on?” He whispered to the skinny man.

“I don’t know, they just said they want to speak to you.” He said, clearly a little curious. Of course, his flatmate had no idea what Seungwoo spent his free time doing, and probably didn’t suspect him of doing anything wrong. Seungwoo put on some more clothes to make himself decent before walking into the living room. There were two uniformed policemen sitting on his couch, waiting patiently for him.

“Um…” He said, getting their attention. “Can I help you?”

“Yes. We’d like you to come down to the police station with us. We would like to ask you some questions.” The two of them stood up. They were about the same height as himself, but much more muscular. Seungwoo felt his blood running cold through his body.

“W-what is this about?” He asked, trying his best to not seem like he was terrified. It was one thing to be caught stalking someone, but another thing to be taken to the police station when he hadn’t even had a coffee to help his mind think clearly yet.

“We’ll talk about that down at the station.” The other man spoke up, his voice stern and intimidating. Seungwoo knew that he couldn’t argue with these guys, even if it was technically illegal to not tell a citizen what he was being taken in for. Seungwoo therefore decided that, in order to save his flatmate from seeing a fight break out, he ought to follow the officer’s orders.

-

“Name?” The police officer asked, Seungwoo now sitting at the guy’s desk. The office was busy, but no one was paying the two of them any attention.

“Ong Seungwoo.” He gladly gave the information. He had thought about it in the car; how unlikely it was that they had found out about the stalking situation. This was more than likely some kind of misunderstanding.

“Age?”

“21.”

“Parents?”

Seungwoo hesitated to answer. Suddenly, the image of his mother’s stern face came into his mind. Even if his true crimes hadn’t been discovered, and he was in here for some misunderstanding, what would she say? Seungwoo vaguely thought of the possibility of her being worried for her son, but quickly got rid of that thought. She had never spared any sympathy for him before, even when something terrible had happened to him. She hadn’t given a damn when his best friend had been run over, instead choosing to scold him for refusing to study that night. Why would this be any different? She would be angry that she had to come and see him in a police station. She wouldn’t drive him home, and would probably give him a smack on the back of the head before going back to ignoring his entire existence.

“…” Seungwoo debated whether to give a fake name or not, but decided against it. He reasoned that it was only inevitable that his mother would have to pick him up and scold him, anyway. “Ong Jieun. No father.” He looked down at his lap, feeling dread overflow in his body.

The policeman proceeded to gather all the rest of the necessary information and then opened his desk drawer to bring out a folder. He opened said folder, and Seungwoo almost felt like fainting. The world around him started to spin a little, and all he could look at, wide-eyed, was a pile of photos, spread across the table in front of him, of Lee Daehwi. These weren’t just any photos, either – they were one ones he had taken.

They proceeded to question the man. Now feeling numb with shock, he of course denied all claims. They hadn’t explained where they found these photos, as many of them he had not sent to Daehwi by mail. That was until they brought his camera out. How they had gotten it, he had no idea. He hadn’t seen them going into his bedroom to retrieve said camera, but he guessed that they could have sent someone in afterwards. Jinyoung wouldn’t have been clever enough to not let them in.

They proceeded to ask Seungwoo why he had all these videos and photographs of the boy on this camera. Seungwoo now decided that the best course of action was to stay silent. He would wait until he could get a lawyer before he would say anything else.

-

He did manage to get a cheap lawyer, since he was short on money and his mother was refusing to come and pick him up. The lawyer was useless, and it was clear quite soon that the evidence pointing at Seungwoo was almost undeniable. Little did Seungwoo know that Lee Daehwi’s family had also gotten involved, hiring their best lawyers to find the truth. There had been an anonymous tip, who had provided evidence that Seungwoo’s computer was the source of the messages, that had pushed the police department to actually do something about the case.

Of course, as soon as Daehwi’s parents heard of the mess, they got involved, too. They came back from their business trips to comfort their son and make sure that anyone who was responsible would pay for it. Seungwoo laughed when he heard of Daehwi’s parent’s return, laughing at the irony of the situation. While Daehwi’s parents helped him, he was being left to rot on his own.

It was only about three days later that his mother finally decided to do something. Seungwoo figured that word of his time in the police cell had gotten out to the public, and that people were beginning to link him with his own mother. After all, even if she denied their relation, the name Ong was not at all common.

She paid his bail, and he was free to go. She had to pick him up herself, but she didn’t say a word to him. To his surprise, however, she ushered him to her fancy car. He had never ridden in such a vehicle before, but under the circumstances, he couldn’t feel happy at the opportunity. She drove in silence, driving to the nearest train station, as she clearly had no idea where he lived. She parked in a nearby car park, and got out the car without a word. She waited in front of said car patiently for him to come out. He did so slowly, trying to figure out what she could possibly do to him in this situation.

As soon as he stepped in front of her, she slapped him right across the face.

“I deserve that.” He admitted, not bothering to rub his prickling cheek.

“Go to the court case. Don’t do anything stupid. I will hire lawyers to get your mess sorted out.” She hissed through her teeth, pure anger showing in her eyes. Seungwoo gulped, a lump forming in his throat.

-

The court hearing came, and he turned up without issue, as he had been told to. He had been allowed to go back home for the week, although his computer had been taken away as evidence. Jinyoung hadn’t been there, as apparently he suddenly had to deal with the death of his grandmother. Seungwoo would have felt bad for his friend, but he had a lot on his plate at the moment.

Seungwoo could barely pay attention during the hearing. The only time he lifted his head was when Daehwi himself stood on the platform, giving his version of events to the jury. He explained how threatened he felt, how the harassment would be constant and unwanted. Seungwoo didn’t care what the boy said; he was only glad to see Daehwi again, after a few weeks of not being able to contact him. He had to hold back a smile as the boy spoke. He also vaguely thought to himself that he must have something wrong with him to feel like this about the person trying to get him a prison sentence.

When it was Seungwoo’s turn to answer questions, he gave short answers, mostly avoiding the question.

“In some messages, you apparently stated that Daehwi was spoilt, and that you want to become Daehwi. What did you mean by this?”

“I didn’t send those messages.”

“Where did you learn to hack in this way? At university?”

“I don’t know how to hack.”

It wasn’t soon before they started correctly guessing the reasons why Seungwoo had been doing such things.

“Looking into your mother’s interview history, she has denied having a child numerous times. You also mentioned Daehwi’s parents many times in your communications with him. Perhaps Seungwoo was jealous of Daewhi’s nurtured upbringing. Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, even if Seungwoo himself doesn’t admit it, wouldn’t this be a clear motive to harass the boy?” one of Daehwi’s lawyers explained, and Seungwoo tried to not tense up at the accuracy. “I looked into this, and found that Seungwoo, who is living in a very basic apartment, struggles to pay his bills monthly. The landlord himself told me this. Seungwoo also apparently works countless hours in order to pay these bills. Now why would the son of a rich and successful scientist be struggling to pay the bills? Wouldn’t a normal parent with the resources support their children so that they can focus on getting a good education?” The lawyer continued.

“Objection.” Seungwoo’s lawyer cut in, and was granted permission to continue. “Mrs. Ong’s parenting style is not relevant to this case. Some parents may choose to leave their children to their own devices while in university, allowing the young adults to gain experience of how the world works.” The lawyer stated, before Daehwi’s lawyer gave his counter argument.

“That may be the case, except I also found that this is not something recent. Seungwoo has been working as a model ever since he was 14, the youngest age that his modelling company accepts. He certainly wasn’t an adult then.” He carried on explaining, and Seungwoo was sinking further and further into his seat. “Furthermore, I asked past co-workers, who said that Seungwoo often stayed for weeks at their homes, because he often said that his mother didn’t want to see him. Now, does this not sound like neglect to you?” The lawyer turned around again to address the jury. “What I’m saying is that Mrs. Ong’s emotional and general neglect of her own child is a clear cause for Seungwoo’s jealousy of Lee Daehwi, who has been living quite the opposite lifestyle.”

Seungwoo began to tune out the hearing after this. He didn’t want to hear them talking badly about his mother, but he couldn’t argue against the facts.

-

By the end of the court case, Seungwoo was found undeniably guilty. His sentence was lightened, however, through the use of a last-minute effort on his lawyer’s part to gain some sympathy for the “misunderstood and troubled boy”. It made Seungwoo sick that anyone would think of him like that, especially since nothing about this case was misunderstood at all, but he kept his mouth shut. He was to spend five months in jail, with an additional 3 months of house arrest, with early probation if he displayed good behaviour, which he certainly planned on doing. And, of course, he was banned from looking for and being anywhere near Lee Daehwi from this point onwards.

He knew that his mother didn’t give a damn about him per se, but only about the consequences of these events. Would people outside of the courtroom also accuse her of child neglect? Would her reputation be on the line, all because of her nuisance son?

He couldn’t bare to look his mother in the face as he exited the courtroom, although he could feel her gaze burning through his skin. Instead of feeling anxious for the months to come, he was instead worried about what consequences his silly actions would cause on his mother’s life.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> btw from this point onwards, the timeline is a bit weird. like the next few chapters will actually happen in the time between when Seongwoo was taken by the police and when the trial actually happens. just warning you in case the timing/plot points seem a bit off!
> 
> also thank you again to everyone that commented/gave kudos/etc!! <3


	9. Bae Jinyoung I

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> just in case this confuses you: this chapter takes place in between the period of seungwoo being released and then being sentenced! as will many of the next few chapters.

He honestly had no idea what was going on with his friend Ong Seungwoo, who had just been taken by the police to the police station. One of them had come back afterwards, asking to search the flat. Jinyoung suspected that he might have been able to refuse, but feared that he would get in trouble for disobeying this man, who could probably break his neck in a heartbeat.

It wasn’t long after those events, however, when he received a phone call from his mother.

“Hey, how are you?” He answered the phone casually. She didn’t usually call in the morning, so this was a pleasant surprise until she dropped the news.

“Darling… I don’t know how to say this…” His mother was clearly sniffling, trying to hold back tears. “Your grandmother has passed away.” She said, and Jinyoung’s smile turned into a look of sadness. “In her sleep, last night. The doctors say it was cardiac arrest.” His mother continued.

“I- I see. How are you?” He said, all previous joy now gone from his voice.

“Not great.” She admitted truthfully. “But I knew that you would want to know first. You were always so close to her.”

Jinyoung thought back to the last few months with her. He visited on a weekly basis, in between photoshoots. She barely recognised him anymore, this illness having confused her memories. Despite this, he always made the effort to visit her and smuggle in her favourite Turkish Delights which technically weren’t allowed in the hospital she was staying in.

The last time he had visited, she had seemed particularly on edge. She had gladly accepted the Turkish Delights and had praised Jinyoung for being a ‘good young doctor’, or something, but soon started shaking when she was whispering about someone banging on the walls, even though there was no such banging noise. She had also grabbed his arm tightly, making the young man jump a little, before warning him ominously. “Always be on the look out. Don’t let anyone grab you like I just did. Otherwise, it’ll haunt you for the rest of your life, like a shadow.” She had said, but by this point the real doctors had come in and were giving her a sedative, despite her resistance. They explained that if they didn’t help her sleep while she was in this state, her frail body would most likely have a heart attack or stroke.

Jinyoung figured that they hadn’t arrived in time last night to save her in the middle of an episode.

“When’s the funeral?” He asked his mother.

“In three days, on Wednesday.”

-

The funeral was fairly standard; there were people singing prayers and a few speeches given by friends and family members before her body was cremated. Jinyoung didn’t give a speech despite being the closest person to her in her last year of life, mostly because he felt too emotional to stand in front of everybody and talk about how great her life was.

The afterparty was similarly average – many people drinking cheap wine and discussing his grandmother’s life and achievements, sending their condolences and heading home. However, Jinyoung and his mother headed back to her hospital room instead of back home, knowing that they had to sort out her remaining belongings. Everything of hers was left to the two of them. At the hospital, they searched through the two full suitcases. Everything left of her now were in these suitcases.

“I’m very sorry about your loss.” A doctor walked in to the room as they were sorting between things to throw out, things to sell and things to keep. Jinyoung looked up and recognised this man as the doctor who had been treating his grandmother.

“And I’m grateful that you spent so much time trying to help her, Doctor Hwang Minhyun.” Jinyoung greeted, shaking the doctor’s hand.

“No, don’t thank me. I couldn’t save her.” He said, his face showing regret. Truthfully, Jinyoung had been surprised at how much effort this man was putting into his grandmother’s condition. Yes, she was clearly ill, but Jinyoung knew that this must have been common with old age. Why was he trying so hard to help his grandmother in particular? Jinyoung had asked the doctor this once, and he had explained that his grandmother’s symptoms matched with a very rare illness that he was trying to find the cure for, but he didn’t understand much beyond that.

“Don’t worry, she was old. She lived a good life, and I’m sure she’s happy wherever she is now.” His mother chimed in, lifting the weight in the air.

“Yes… again, I’m sorry for your loss.” He said before bowing slightly and taking his leave.

As the two of them searched the suitcases, Jinyoung spotted a cassette tape stored in a side pocket. On the label was written “5”. His mother suggested to throw it away, reasoning that no one used cassette tapes anymore, but Jinyoung decided to store it in his own backpack – perhaps there was some memory of his grandmother’s, or a song she liked. It could be something he could keep to remind him of her.

-

Back at his flat, Seungwoo had returned. He had explained something about being falsely accused, and having to go to a court hearing next week, but Jinyoung didn’t fully follow, not quite being able to understand what his friend was talking about with his legal and computer terminology. After the catch up, he proceeded to try and purchase a cheap cassette tape player from eBay. It arrived a few days later, no problem. Jinyoung had a little trouble setting it up, having never used a cassette player before, but eventually figured it out.

The contents of the cassette tape were nothing shy of strange. It was his grandmother’s voice, but instead of her usual sing-song voice, it was completely monotonous. There was a tapping noise in the background, which made it a little difficult for Jinyoung to concentrate on what she was saying.

A little frustrated, he rewound the tape and pressed play again, deciding to write down her words as she spoke them. That way, he could read them afterwards without the distracting tapping noise. He wrote the following down on a blank piece of paper:

“Haven’t heard it in days. Doctor says I’m getting better, but I know that it’s just waiting to come back bigger and stronger. All I can dream is the number five. Five. Five. Five. I see it everywhere. It used to be four, and it started at 0, back all those years ago. Written on the walls, and I hear everyone saying the number five, five, five.” Jinyoung paused the tape, taking a deep breath. Was he really going to listen to his grandmother, in some kind of delusional trance? He debated whether to stop out of respect, but decided to carry on anyway.

“They think I’m crazy, just a crazy lady, but I’ve seen these numbers for so long… Doctor says that they don’t mean anything, they’re just in my head, but I know he’s lying. He’s just as confused about them as I am.” There was a pause before she began to speak again. “I stabbed a pencil through a drawing of someone’s body. It was the arm. I feel like there is that hole in myself. Like a bubble, like a hole in my body. Maybe that’s what’s wrong with me – there’s something there.” She said, before the tape cut off to playing some classical music. Jinyoung listened to the music, almost expecting her voice to cut back in again and talk some more, but that never came.

He frowned deeply, trying to understand what her words meant. Of course, he couldn’t come to any conclusion, but felt as if there was some kind of hidden meaning behind the jumbled up speech. Did the number five represent something? What did she mean, a hole in her body? Was this pure delusion, or was there some real-life meaning to her words?

He left the cassette playing as he cooked dinner that evening, the classical music filling the half-empty apartment.

-

The next day, he had a day off. He had quite a few of those days recently, as that was the life of a model. Sometimes he had a jam-packed schedule of photoshoots followed by runways followed by more photoshoots for days on end, but sometimes he didn’t have any work for weeks at a time. This was one of those latter times.

He decided to listen to the tape again. He listened to it a few times, gaining next to no new information. Frustrated, he decided to go to the large city library to do some more hands-on research. As he got there, paying the fee to enter, he headed straight for the Morse code section. It was a long shot, but the tapping noise on the tape seemed to be intentional, suggesting a hidden meaning. He figured after a lot of thinking that she may have included some kind of religious or spiritual symbol of word; Jinyoung knew that she was always a very spiritual person.

Of course, he had no idea if this was Morse code, or just tapping along to a rhythm playing in her head, but he needed to know for sure. It took a few hours of trying to understand the books with random dots inside them before he understood how the code worked.

He made a few notes to remember what he had learnt before heading back home. As soon as he arrived, he played the tape again, jotting down lines and dots to signify the taps in the audio. He then proceeded to try and translate the rough lines and dots into letters and words.

‘t a k e i t o u t’. Take it out? Jinyoung wondered what, exactly, needed to be taken out. Was this some kind of religious reference? Was this translation just a pure coincidence? He didn’t know, but he searched the words through an online search engine anyway. On the first page showed nothing of interest; mostly English definitions of ‘Take-out’. The next few pages of search results were scattered with obscure blog posts of people talking about various topics from murder to going on a picnic. Jinyoung had almost given up until he clicked on the 10th page.

At the top of the list of this page was an image search result: a black-and-white sketch, seemingly in biro on some average cartridge paper, of the words ‘take it out’ repeated many times, over an outline of a body. The image caught Jinyoung’s eye, and he clicked on it, which took him to a new blog titled ‘Yoon Jisung’, who he assumed was the writer of these blog posts. The page with the image didn’t contain any explanatory text; only the picture, with links to other pages on his website. Jinyoung clicked on the ‘sketches’ tab of the website, taking him to a page full of images of sketches. Some were drawings of people sitting on the train, or naked bodies, or even quick landscape sketches. However, there were a few in particular that Jinyoung was very interested in.

Every few pictures, there would be a new picture of the outline of a body. It didn’t have any details, unlike the other sketches, but they all had some kind of hole in them. One had a hole in the figure’s hand, another in the stomach, and another in the neck. Jinyoung couldn’t help but think of what his grandmother had said in the tape: ‘I stabbed a pencil through a drawing of someone’s body’. Was this linked to what his grandmother had experienced?

He sent a heartfelt but to-the-point email to this artist, requesting to meet him to discuss these particular sketches.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> again, thank you for reading/commenting/etc!!!!! <3 not many chapters to go now, will jinyoung find out what this code means? will jihoon complete his revenge goals? will we find out what this illness is??? :) let's find out~


	10. Yoon Jisung I

He painted to clear his mind. Otherwise, his thoughts would be nothing but jumbled and confused. When he had started to draw, he usually just scribbled down the images trapped in his mind, or illustrated his dreams. They were the sort of drawings that looked like they were drawn by a toddler, which made sense because he was, at the time, a toddler. As his artistic side flourished while he grew up, so did his skills. He had developed his art style to incorporate aspects of art nouveau, as well as modern fashion trends and various other ideas. He was successful and usually happy doing what he loved to do the most in the world. The only problem was when he felt that rare pang of an existential crisis; he often questions what the meaning of his art was, what meaning it had. If it could ever help someone on a larger level than aesthetic enjoyment. Despite this, he carried on, always taking on new opportunities and finding ways to develop his art.

However, for the last year or so, while he still drew his usual skilful pieces, that need to just scribble whatever came into his mind had made its comeback. His dreams had become riddled with strange images and storylines. Above everyone’s head in those dreams would be a number. Recently, he had felt an utter urge to draw the outline of bodies. They were very rough and completely inaccurate; a simple child’s drawing. He had left them hanging in his studio, which was open to the public on Mondays and Sundays.

That was when he began to realise that there must have been something important coming with these impulsive drawings of his. Occasionally, when someone saw these pictures hanging up in his studio, they would suddenly lash out at it, either trying to rip the page apart, or they would poke a hole through it. They would always apologize afterwards, or just run away in embarrassment.

The hole or tare was never in the same spot, but Jisung was clever enough to know that the damage meant something, that they were connected. How they were connected, though, he had no idea. That was why he jumped at the opportunity to meet with the man who had emailed him, asking to meet him regarding these drawings. Perhaps he could help him understand this mystery.

They decided to meet in a quaint little café in the city centre. Jisung ordered several cakes when he arrived, being a sweet tooth himself, and waited for Jinyoung. When the man eventually arrived, a little late, they shook hands and sat down together.

“How has your day been?” The younger man said, obviously trying to make some small talk. He was very awkward about it and Jisung was having none of it.

“Never mind how my day has been, let’s get straight to the juicy details.” Jisung waved off the question, not wanting to waste time on getting to what he wanted to know. “So why, exactly, are these drawings of interest to you?” He placed a folder filled with these drawings onto a table.

“Um…” Jinyoung stared at the drawings that had sprawled out on the table. “Can I take a look?”

“Sure, they’re not precious to me or anything. Go ahead.” He said, gulping down a slice of cake as Jisung proceeded to inspect several of the drawings.

“My grandmother… she spoke about stabbing a drawing of a body before she died. I was curious about it, since I got the feeling that it really meant something, you know, not just an old person rambling about nothing… so I looked it up and I found these drawings.” He explained as he flipped through each rough drawing. “What’s this one?” He asked, handing Jisung a piece of paper with several stick men and numbers written on it.

“Oh, that. Basically, I don’t usually draw like this, y’know? But recently I’ve just had this urge to draw these shitty drawings. I don’t know why, but I feel like exploding until I get them down on paper. In this folder isn’t just the body drawings, but all of the drawings I had the impulse to draw. I figured that they might all be connected, somehow, so you might want to look at them, too.” He explained to Jinyoung, who absorbed the information like a sponge. “The numbers, I have no idea what they represent. But the number next to the letters L.D. have gone down, I think it was at five before. It’s zero now.” He explained as the younger man stared at the childish image. The younger man then carried on flipping through the drawings. He also proceeded to explain to Jinyoung about how those drawings came to have holes in them, and described several of the people.

“The most recent was this one.” He pointed to a drawing of a torso with a hole in the shoulder a while later. “He seemed young, probably still in school. He kept mumbling under his breath and clutching at his shoulder.”

They stayed there for hours, Jinyoung inspecting each and every shred of paper. Only one more drawing seemed different from the others.

“And… this one?” He asked again. Jisung had finished his cakes by this point. The drawing seemed like just a scribble at first sight, but when you looked closer, there was more detail. It was in a kind of star-shape, with the centre seeming to be the main mass of whatever object it was, with many arms reaching out further onto the page and branching out.

“Right. It doesn’t look like it, but I was thinking of cells while drawing that. I mean like biological cells.”

“Any idea what it means? Like, why you drew it?”

“Nope.”

The entire café table was now covered with the scribbles. Soon, they would have to pack up and leave; it was getting late and the staff at the counter kept eyeing them, the last customers, as if telling them psychopathically to get out.

“I…” Jinyoung started to say, but then shut his mouth and sighed.

“What is it? Say it, because even if it’s a stupid idea, it might help us to understand what’s going on with my drawings.” Jisung encouraged him, wanting to understand his own art as much as Jinyoung did.

“These drawings… you think they’re just art right? And they probably are. They’re probably just you drawing things you dreamt and can’t remember, or maybe you’re just going through an art crisis and style change. Maybe you’re just humouring me and looking for someone to give meaning to your art. But…” He hesitated to continue. “I can’t help but feel like there is some real connection to this and my grandmothers’ illness.”

“You mean… you think I might have the same illness?”

“…No. I think the people who put the holes in these drawings have the illness, the same as my grandmother, and there is a reason those people did so. I think that whatever that illness was is becoming more common, and a cure needs to be found now more than ever. Before more people are irreversibly damaged.” Jinyoung continued, now looking into his lap, his eyes glazed over in thought. Jisung stayed silent, knowing that the best thing to do was let the man think, uninterrupted. After a while, Jisung finally spoke again. “If you wouldn’t mind… could we please show these drawings to a doctor I know?”

Jisung honestly didn’t truly understand what this illness was yet, nor how his art had any connection to it, but he knew that he wanted to find out.  Could these scribbles be of actual use to someone? He knew that was unlikely, but he figured that he ought to at least give it a try. “Sure.” He replied.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this one is so so short T_T and i guess it's not even the most important chapter either, but i thought it might be pretty neat to have art play some part in the story too, plus i needed a role for jisung lmao T_T sorry for this not-so-great chapter
> 
> also if you haven't figured it out, the numbers represent how much danger the boys are in!!


	11. Hwang Minhyun I

Minhyun calmly threw the threatening letter into his shredder. This was perhaps the 50th letter he had received from someone calling themselves ‘P.J.’. Every single letter would go into detail about why he deserved to suffer, be hurt and die.

He would have gone to the police, except he knew that he couldn’t. First of all, he was already conducting unofficial medical practices which was debatably illegal; helping these people with that mysterious illness that he had been trying to find the cure for since he started to work as a doctor. What was illegal about it was that it was uncharted by the hospitals, and he did not have permission to be carrying out research on these patients. However, not only did most of these patients have no way to pay for official treatment, but whenever Minhyun would ask to carry out official research, his enquiries were rejected. He didn’t know why. But what he did know was that he was the best chance these people, and any other people after them, had to survive this mysterious illness.

Second of all, he felt as if he half agreed with the contents of the letters. The sender never failed to point out how many people had suffered or died under his care. While the cause of their suffering or death was never because of his mistreatment, he often felt as if his lack of knowledge was why these people had to carry on suffering. If he studied more, found out more about this illness… he could save so many people. He couldn’t save that old lady, but perhaps he could save this boy called Park Woojin. He was currently working on analysing his blood samples to see if there were any anomalies that he could find out. So far, though, nothing. Just like all the other patients he had tried to treat before.

He vaguely remembered the meeting he had with the boy, telling him of this terrible illness that slowly ate away at his senses and sanity. Of course, he hadn’t worded it quite like that, but said the same words in a slightly less ominous way. The boy had a lot of life in him – Minhyun’s youngest patient with this illness yet. He therefore hoped that the boy’s degeneration into insanity would be over a much longer period of time – perhaps even enough time to cure the illness.

The only difference between this letter and all the ones he had received before was that this one seemed to have an extra tone of intent. There was something about how the hand-writing was more messy than usual, about how the writing seemed to have almost ripped through the page that suggested the writer really wanted to hurt Minhyun. He often thought to himself that he hoped he may eventually be able to meet his person, to explain to them that he was trying so, so hard to help. He was trying so hard, but perhaps if the only way to help was to suffer himself, then so be it. Because if he could never find a cure – then what other way would there be to atone for how many people he had hurt than to hurt himself?

That was when he heard a knocking on his door. He quickly closed the files open on his desk, hiding his research from whoever would be peeping in his office.

“Hello?” He called out. The door opened and he was greeted by two pairs of eyes. “Bae Jinyoung?” He asked, surprised to see the younger man at this time. “How can I help?”

The two men walked in as the other introduced himself as Jisung, a friend of Jinyoung’s. They sat down on the chairs in front of his desk.

“I… don’t know how to say this without sounding crazy.” Jinyoung started to speak rather slowly.

“Okay… take your time.” Minhyun also spoke slowly, worrying whether the man was okay or not. There was a silence in the room before anyone spoke again.

“I… I found a recording from my grandmother. And I know you might just tell me that she was just rambling mindlessly, but- I don’t know, I want you to know this. She spoke about stabbing a drawing of a human body. And how there was something there in her own body, or something like that.” He spoke messily, and Minhyun struggled to follow along. He also struggled to see what this had to do with anything. “So I was curious, and I found Jisung’s drawings. Apparently many people coming to his gallery-”

“Studio.” Jisung corrected.

“Right. People coming to his studio kept also stabbing or ripping these drawings. And those people also seemed to be in a sort of trance – similar to what Grandma was in a lot of the time, you know? I know it’s a long shot but – I don’t know, I think it may have a link to my grandmother’s illness. Here.” Jinyoung grabbed a pile of papers out from his bag and laid them on the desk. “Take a look. Dr. Hwang, does this mean anything to you?” Jinyoung looked Minhyun pleadingly in the eye. The explanation, while muddled, did intrigue Minhyun. He did hear a couple of his patients before talk about destroying drawings of human figures. Park Woojin had also confessed in a recent meeting that he had strangely lashed out on a drawing of a man’s body, for no known reason. Minhyun looked at the drawings vaguely.

“I suspect… this may just be me reaching for clues to find a cure for this damn illness… but a few of my patients have done similar things.” He sighed. It was too late in the evening for his brain to work hard. “If possible, could I please make a few photocopies of these?”

-

The next morning, he had almost completely shrugged off the drawings. He figured that he was just being silly, putting hope for scientific revelations into meaningless art, but he couldn’t help but still feel a nagging sensation. As he worked on the formula for his next serum, the photocopies of drawings sitting on top of his desk were staring at him.

Sighing, he paused his work before sitting down and staring at the drawings for a while again. What on earth could a bunch of destroyed drawings have to do with this illness?

At his next meeting with Park Woojin, he decided to enquire more about the art ordeal.

“You mentioned lashing out at a drawing a few weeks ago, if I recall correctly. If you don’t mind me asking, in what way did you ‘lash out’ at the drawing?” He asked while massaging the boy’s shoulders. While he was there to gather information from the boy, he also tried his best to treat him. For now, the best he could do was prescribe drugs to reduce the chances of hallucinations (which weren’t working very well), and give him a massage in the area that he complained hurt a lot.

“Oh, right. Um. I just grabbed the drawing a ripped the man’s shoulder off.” He explained casually.

“…Right.” Minhyun replied. He didn’t ask anything else for a while, deep in thought. Woojin didn’t interrupt his train of thought, probably just happy to be receiving some relief from his shoulder pain. “Hey, Woojin.” He piped up after a while. “Do you mind if I give your shoulder a few scans?”

“Okay… but why?” He asked.

“Don’t worry, there’s probably nothing, but it might help to see if there is something physical causing your sensations.”

-

He didn’t tell Woojin, but the results of the MRI scan were simply astounding. He looked at the images that he had printed after Woojin left. What he could see was a normal male figure with a very strange anomaly. In Woojin’s shoulder was a strange mass, with branches sticking out and seemingly reaching deep into his body, even into his brain. On the image was an outlined shape, each arm of this shape reading far into his body, some arms wrapping around Woojin’s spinal chord. Thing is, it was only a slightly lighter shade than the rest of the scan, so to someone who wasn’t searching for such a thing, they may have missed it. But it was definitely there – something was inside Woojin’s body, probably growing and somehow attaching itself to the boy’s nervous system. And what confused Minhyun the most was that it didn’t look anything like cancer or a tumour. It was unlike anything he had seen before.

-

He stayed up all night long, for days in a row, working on nothing but coffee and fast food. Every step he took to try and figure out what this thing was would meant that he was a step closer to finding out an effective way to treat his patients. He felt as if he was so close. Before now, he had never even considered that the cause of this illness could have been something physical. He always assumed it was neurological, or psychological. But with this evidence, thanks to Jisung and Jinyoung’s tips, he felt as if he was just about to find all the answers he needed.

He crossed off all the possibilities of what he knew the strange mass could be. It wasn’t cancer. It wasn’t a tumour. It wasn’t a cyst. He checked every illness he could think of, but none of the symptoms, nor the properties of the mass, matched with anything he had seen or heard of before.

However, there was one thought in the back of his mind. It kept whispering to him, but he ignored the thoughts, refusing to believe that this was a possibility. Every few hours of tireless reading and testing of his samples, the thought that the mass could be a parasite would pop into his mind before he pushed the idea back into the depths of his brain. However, the properties of the thing were eerily similar to that of a parasite; it could easily feed off of Woojin’s nutrients from the position it was in, and it had somehow injected itself into, and grown inside Woojin.

But he refused to believe that this was even a slight possibility. That was, until he looked through Woojin’s medical records for the hundredth time that day. This time, he noticed the name of the hospital he had gone to just over ten years ago. It was a fairly small hospital in the suburbs of the city, but the name stood out to him for some reason.

He was now too tired to really question why he was doing certain things anymore; so without thinking about it, he looked through his other patients’ records. Bae Jinyoung’s grandmother: she had been to that hospital just over fifteen years ago. The patient he had treated three years ago: he had also been admitted to that hospital for a short time around twelve years ago. The first people he had met with this illness, a couple called Mr and Mrs Park, were currently living in that hospital’s mental ward, and before they had been admitted there, had been signed to that hospital for many years beforehand.

He looked through every single patient of his; and, strangely, every single one of those patients had been to that hospital at least once. Whether they had gone for a simple checkup, or had received surgery there, every single one of them had gone there. And now they all had this illness. _But correlation isn’t causation_ , Minhyun told himself. Was he just being paranoid in a tired state, thinking that this hospital could have somehow caused this thing to be inside of them? Could this thing really be a parasite?

He considered the possibility that something darker than he had originally thought could be going on inside this hospital. He felt fear as he imagined how this hospital could be conducting some kind of human experimentation. He thought about how his research into these people’s symptoms was always rejected by the board, how they always stated that they did not see a need for research. But, really, that made no sense. Why would they not allow him to research the cause of a never-seen-before illness that was causing serious harm to those effected? Were they trying to hide something?

It all made too much sense.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sorry for the long time between updates - i've been super busy! but i promise, i WILL finish this story, and i'll try to finish it before the summer! :) Thanks to everyone still reading this, especially after the last chapter which i now hate lmao.


	12. Kang Daniel II

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> WARNING: MAJOR GORE! don't read if you're squeamish.
> 
> anyway here's some kind-of nielwoon for y'all :) and some major angst and plot development, finally lol

Over the few days that Daniel waited for Jaehwan’s reply, he spent more and more time with the short man. At this point, they were spending time together almost every day, and on the days where he didn’t see Sungwoon, he felt as if his day was incomplete. He never brought the scars up again, wanting to know more before he spoke to the prostitute about it again. Besides, he didn’t want to see the man upset any further. He enjoyed seeing Sungwoon happy; he had noticed that he really liked it when Daniel would bring over board games and they could play together. Daniel had also noticed Sungwoon’s habit of biting his nails, the way he laughed with his eyes closed into crescents, and how the boy’s hair looked flawlessly silky-smooth.

It didn’t take a genius to know that he had formed a big fat crush on this guy. It wasn’t as if Daniel had never been in a relationship before; back all those years ago, before this whole revenge-fiasco has started, Daniel had dated a fair few girls and boys. However, he, Jihoon and Jaehwan had all agreed that until they had completed their mission, it was in their best interests to avoid forming meaningful relationships with others, whether that be in the form of romance or even friendships. Daniel had therefore settled with occasional hook-ups to satisfy his sexual and romantic urges. Of course, for someone who also enjoyed close and meaningful relationships, this was difficult. And he couldn’t help but occasionally imagine with glee that, after Jihoon’s revenge was finished, he could finally ask Sungwoon out on a date.

He was surprised to wake up to an email from Jaehwan with a link and instructions to a certain website. Knowing his way fairly well around the deep web (although not nearly as well as Jaehwan), he used his computer to access the site. He was, understandably, shocked at the contents of the page to say the least. He saw images of blood, people tied to tables with chains, and pictures of various torture devices. It didn’t take long for him to figure out that this was some kind of Red Room; a website set up to film torture for the pleasure of viewers. It seemed to run from profits of those who wanted to have their requests carried out, but that wasn’t what Daniel was thinking about right now.

He felt his stomach drop at the realisation that the man who ran this site, The Host, was most likely who Sungwoon was referring to. But he didn’t want to believe that; he searched through the library of hundreds of videos, some dating back to as far as ten years ago. None of the people were named, each given some kind of number. It was sickening how these people had been reduced to nothing but a number and a piece of meat.

He clicked on the next page, and then the next, viewing each thumbnail. Every few videos or so, there would be a new victim. Daniel vaguely wondered how many of those people were now dead, and how many had managed to get away. The people who got away would probably be scarce; surely, if there were more, this man would have been stopped already.

He scrolled further and further down, feeling a sense of relief that he hadn’t seen any video with Sungwoon in the thumbnail. Surely, this meant that this was the wrong ‘Host’, no? Daniel was ready to leave the site as he clicked on page 108 of the site, the last page, before stopping in his tracks. Right there, in the thumbnails, were pictures of none other than Sungwoon. He seemed a bit younger, probably in his mid-teens, but it was definitely him. There seemed to be seven videos of him here, all posted over the span of about a year and half, starting from around six years ago. He had been given the number 2. That clearly represented how Sungwoon was the second victim of this man’s documented crimes.

Swallowing first, he clicked on one of the videos. It opened up and started playing with ease. The masked man, ‘The Host’, introduced the video by explaining how today was a fan request video. Daniel could see a younger Sungwoon’s body tied to some kind of structure hanging from the wall, struggling against the restraints. Daniel’s heart beat sped up in fear, but he couldn’t click away.

The video was over an hour long; at first, the man whipped Sungwoon until his back bled. He then read the requests out loud, telling Sungwoon, who was already writhing in pain, how he was going to break his leg and cut his skin open. Sungwoon’s response was that of pure terror, screaming through the cloth that had been shoved in his mouth, struggling to break free from the chains he had been tied up in.

The Host did exactly as he said. After he broke Sungwoon’s leg, he let the crying boy out of the chains to pull himself along the floor in an attempt to get away from the man. If Sungwoon stopped moving in defeat, the man would start to whip the boy again. Daniel felt sick as the man stepped on Sungwoon’s just-broken leg as he begged to be let go, tears flowing down his face. The man then picked the opposite leg’s foot up and cut into the sole of Sungwoon’s feet so deep that blood flowed out and onto the floor.

The video carried on in a similar manner while The Host finished all of the requests. In the span of this two-hour video, Sungwoon was beaten, drugged and raped. By the end of this session, Sungwoon was a crumpled mess on the floor, crying and screaming in a pool of his own blood. The Host, for some reason, also showed Sungwoon being administered medical help, putting his leg in a cast and stitching up some of the worst cuts. Daniel assumed that this was to reassure the viewers that Sungwoon would be back for more videos later on. Daniel felt a few tears fall down his own face. He was barely processing the fact that the man he had grown so attached to these last few weeks had gone through this.

When the video finished, he closed his web browser and re-read the email sent by Jaehwan. It didn’t give enough information regarding how to track this guy down. Daniel didn’t hesitate to ask Jaehwan to help him.

-

“Daniel… this guy is dangerous. He’s not a simple scientist with no self defence skills.” Jaehwan frowned at Daniel after he asked Jaehwan to track down the location of The Host.

“I know, god damn it. I don’t care. I’m trained for this and I need to do it.” He said, fists clenched at the memory of the video he saw.

“Okay.” Jaehwan sighed. Daniel knew that he would probably tell Jihoon, who would in turn tell him off for doing something irresponsible without sufficient planning. But he didn’t care; he needed this man to be dead, to be gone from this earth. He had taken the night to think, and realised that the men who beat Sungwoon up before were likely people who had seen these videos; how many people had seen Sungwoon hurting like that, and enjoyed it? How many more people would be irreversibly scarred because of this man?

As far as Daniel was concerned, this man, and anyone who watched these videos for pleasure, needed to die.

It took a while for Jaehwan to figure out the location of The Host; not only was this man also very adept in protecting his identity and location, but he seemed to move around a lot. This was why it took several weeks for Daniel to receive the address he needed. In the meanwhile, a lot happened: Not only did he make sure to visit Sungwoon as often as possible, but there was now a lot of development with Jihoon. They had found out that Seungwoo was a stalker, and used that information to start to take down Mrs. Ong. They didn’t even need to do a whole lot after they left the anonymous tip about him with the police – the public seemed to be doing that work for them already. There were numerous slanderous articles being spread about Mrs. Ong, specifically how her harsh parenting style had been the main cause for her son to go ‘off the rails’. This was already leading to some questioning her reasoning ability and hence whether she was to be trusted to take care of many patients in need of proper care. Jihoon was gloating about this success endlessly.

Additionally, in the last few days, Minhyun had very obviously been attempting to make contact with Park Jihoon, who had been sending him many threatening messages. From what they could see from spying on him, he seemed a lot more busy than usual, his office far more messy and cluttered than normal. It was clear he was up to something, and for some reason wanted to tell his harassers about it. Jihoon was setting up the operation to meet with the Doctor at the very same moment when Jaehwan finally cracked the code and found The Host’s address.

Daniel received the e-mail in the middle of the night, and opened it up straight away – he had been anxious to know the location of this man for weeks now, itching to let some blood spill. Every day after he came home from spending time with Sungwoon he felt a deep-seated itch to find that man and hurt him. So, when he saw that the location had been found, he jumped out of bed and quickly looked the location up. He made a mental note to treat Jaehwan to whatever meal he wanted tomorrow.

Jaehwan had informed Daniel that the man’s location seemed to change very often and it therefore wouldn’t be surprising if he moved to a different location within the next few days. Therefore, Daniel knew he had to act quickly. The location was outside of the city, an area that didn’t seem to have many houses. Daniel smiled to himself, knowing that since there were no neighbours, he would have every opportunity to make this man scream in pain, and no reason to hold back.

He spent the next hour getting ready. He carried a handgun with him, and two pocket knives. He dressed in all black – that way, when he made his way home, the blood wouldn’t be visible to onlookers. He was going to go by bus and then bike – this late at night, only drunkards and tired workers would be on the bus, so they wouldn’t take any notice of him. He would then need to hire a rentable bike, which he would pay for via cash to keep anonymous, to this exact location. As for what he would do afterwards, he didn’t quite know yet, but he knew that he was likely going to get caught up in a fight. Even if they guy in the videos didn’t seem muscular, he clearly had many weapons and torture devices – he therefore likely had various self-defence measures in place, too.

The journey there was uneventful. As Daniel approached nearer the location of this man, it became even quieter, the suburban streets deserted and fields quiet as night. Even the bike ride there was rather nice. He soon approached the place – it looked like an old house, or maybe a cottage. It was quite small, and very isolated, as it was surrounded by trees and bushes. There was no way this man could scream for help from out here. Again, Daniel smiled. This man had probably chosen this location so that he could hurt his victims effortlessly, but now this was going to backfire on him.

Daniel rested his bike against a tree before quietly circling the house. There were several windows – no lights were on, so Daniel assumed that the man was asleep. There was one door at the front of the property, and one at the back. From the windows, Daniel could see that the back door led to the kitchen, and the front door to the living room. Everything looked strangely serene. It was quiet, the insides of the house unmoving. And yet, Daniel thought, there was probably someone tied up, bleeding and in utter pain, locked away in this place. Daniel thought that the place must have a basement – that would be the perfect place for torture. He slowly got nearer the house to see if there were any trap doors for a basement. As expected, there was one near the back door, covered in grass and only noticeable if you were standing right next to it.

Daniel saw that there seemed to be no lock on it, and proceeded to attempt to open the door. He kept his gun tightly in his hand while he slowly lifted the creaking door, making sure to let out as little noise as possible. Daniel’s adrenaline was sky-high at this point. He finally felt excitement, that thing he had been craving for years.

He slowly made his way down the stairs once the door was open. It was dark inside, but he slowly let his eyes adjust to see the faint outline of various torture equipments. Specifically, there was a table with vices attached to it, a few saws hanging on the walls, and lots of cleaning equipment. And, most importantly, a body that had been nailed to a cross, Jesus-style. For a vague moment, Daniel considered the possibility that the unmoving body was simply asleep, but that thought was soon dismissed when he realised that no-one would be able to sleep with nails in their hands and feet. Daniel approached the body to examine it. There were words carved into the girl’s skin, ‘slave’, ‘meat’, ‘slut’. Daniel almost felt like vomiting. The body stared soullessly into the darkness of the room, her life clearly taken from her too early. The blood was a dark red, suggesting that she had been dead as little as half a day.

Daniel proceeded to inspect the room further, finding stairs that led upstairs. He slowly and quietly explored the ground floor of the home, which looked average, if a little dusty. However, he made his first mistake when he tripped over a small fold in the carpet, accidentally knocking against the living room’s cupboard in the process of trying to find his balance. This made a loud noise, and Daniel immediately knew that if anyone was sleeping upstairs in this tiny home, they would have been awoken by it.

Daniel therefore quickly found a place to hide, choosing to slide himself into the coat cupboard near the entrance. Through a small gap between the cupboard doors, he had a very slight view of the stairway.

As expected, there were soon footsteps coming down from upstairs. They were quiet, the man clearly trying to make no noise, but since this place was so old, the steps were still audible. The man, from what Daniel could see, had a baseball bat in his hands. He tried to keep his breathing silent.

The man seemed to be checking every corner of the living room, and was soon approaching the cupboard that Daniel was inside of. His heart pounding, he took the opportunity of the man being so close to jump out and tackle him. Being a lot taller and stronger, he knocked the skinny man against the staircase railings, and he let out a breath of surprise before trying to attack Daniel.

Daniel dodged the swing of the man’s bat, although said man was very fast and did manage to almost hit his sides a few times. Daniel could have easily shot the man in the face right there and then, but wouldn’t let himself. He wanted to hurt the man like he had hurt Sungwoon. Like he had hurt that poor dead girl in the basement. Like he had hurt all those other people on his disgusting site. He didn’t deserve a quick death.

And so, Daniel instead pointed the gun at the man’s hip, shooting and successfully hitting him. Immediately, the man bent over in shock, dropping the bat and clutching at his hip. He fell over, probably due to the bullet damaging the nerves and bones between his hip and his right leg. Daniel quickly kicked the baseball bat away before kicking the man right in the stomach, really hard. The man shouted, and tried to scramble around on the floor to find his bat again. But, by now, it was far away at the opposite side of the room. Daniel shot at the man’s shoulder, just to make sure that he couldn’t easily drag himself over to get the bat. Again, the man screamed. He didn’t scream about anything, just unintelligible noises. Similar to how Sungwoon was screaming in that video Daniel had seen, but instead of making Daniel want to cry, it only urged him on more.

Daniel stood over the man’s writhing body, examining his features. He was an ugly man. He wasn’t disformed or anything – just ugly. The man looked up at him, a mixture of fear and desperation in his eyes. Daniel stepped a foot onto the man’s hips, putting pressure in the exact point where there would be extreme pain. The man screamed again.

“No one will hear you scream from here.” Daniel said, his voice a lot calmer than he felt. “Especially not that girl downstairs.”

Daniel grabbed the man by the hair, lifting his whole body weight from that one point and dragging him to the stairs that lead to the basement. The man, struggling in Daniel’s strong grasp, was helpless, and Daniel knew it.

He threw the man onto the table with various vices on, proceeding to hold him down with said vices. He screwed them down so tightly that the man’s skin started to rip. The man, by this point, wasn’t screaming anymore, but panting very loudly. Fear was the only emotion in his eyes right now. He looked at Daniel and tried to form some words with his mouth, perhaps to plead for forgiveness. But before he could make a sound, Daniel had gotten his hands on a pair of pliers that were hanging on the wall. The man’s eyes widened at this, and he started to struggle to get free again.

Daniel held the man’s head down and forced his mouth open, so that he could take each tooth out with the pliers one by one. The man screamed, blood filling his mouth, but miraculously he stayed conscious. Honestly, Daniel wasn’t getting any satisfaction from torturing this guy – he honestly just wanted him to die already. But he knew that when he saw Sungwoon later he would regret it if he hadn’t made this man feel even a fraction of the pain that Sungwoon had felt.

And he did exactly that. As he wasn’t exactly adept in using torture devices, the area soon got messy, and he was sure that the man was about to pass out. Daniel therefore knew that this was the time he must use to finish his activities. He had skinned the man’s hand, and burnt his testicles. However, there was one last thing he wanted to do to the man before taking his worthless life.

Daniel sat on top of the man, who was barely conscious.

“Hey, look at me.” Daniel said in a soothing voice, and the man did so. Daniel then proceeded to shove his thumbs into the man’s eye sockets as he screamed a pig’s squeal. Blood gushed out of his face. Daniel took his hands out and quickly finished the man off by slicing his throat wide open.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i hope you all enjoyed! one chapter left, and everything will somehow come to a conclusion???! 
> 
> again, thank you to all the commenters and everyone who has read so far!! :) <3

**Author's Note:**

> please leave some feedback, it really means a lot to me! :)


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